GaWx

Unfortunately, after nine days straight of a widespread wetter than normal signal in the SE US for the week April 27-May 3, today’s Euro Weeklies run was much drier in most of the SE: Yesterday’s run: 9th wet run in a row Today’s run: drier signal much of the SE

You’re saying how this being U.S. only limits how broadly you can interpret it. But at the same time, many of your recent posts ITT have been U.S. only! You wouldn’t even consider the intense cold in Canada in March. You’re not being consistent.

Ray and Chris, If Nino 3.4 is at +2C vs 1991-2020 and surrounding tropics are also at +2C vs 1991-2020, there’s no warm El Niño tongue to do its forcing. Thus, it’s essentially neutral rather than super El Niño and officially is neutral for RONI. So, RONI is a better measure for strength of El Niño and La Niña for that matter. Do y’all agree? @bluewave

This illustrates how much warmer the surrounding tropical areas were during 2023-4, which means a RONI significantly cooler than ONI due to the lowered contrast: Look at the much larger contrast in 1982-3:

Indeed, the CFSv2 gets Nino 3 to just above +3.0 in Nov and Dec for non-relative anomalies:

Today’s EWs continue to look good overall (certainly much better than how it’s been in the SE for most weeks in recent months) during the two weeks 4/27-5/10: 4/27-5/3: 5/4-10:

Related to what you’re saying: As JB has emphasized, the models in 2023 that had the beautiful E US trough/Aleutian low that some of us here were repeatedly posting and very excited about were also forecasting the typical BN SSTs around Australia. Had it actually been relatively cold around Australia, JB believes that the E US would have had a cold winter. But alas, it turned out warm around Australia, atypical of El Niño. Is 2026 going to end up colder around Australia like JB expects?

Today’s Euro Weeklies have ~2” of rainfall in the NW burbs of ATL and >2” in NW GA/N AL 4/27-5/3!

Hey Mitch, It’s probably to get extra clicks and likes. And then some are typically a bit over the top normally.

Thanks, snowman. Here’s the RONI version of the CFSv2, which has a peak of ~+2.25 in OND…that’s near the RONI peak of 1972-3 and 1991-2, only slightly cooler than 1997-8 and 2015-6, and a bit cooler than 1982-3: This +2.25 is a significant increase over its +2.0 OND forecast RONI peak in the run from one week ago, which is likely largely tied to its warmer April starting point:

There was also a low of 43 at KSAV, their coldest low since way back on March 19th, while KSVN had 47. The forecasted lows had been only down to the low 50s. This was the largest morning low colder than forecast bust in quite a long time in this area. Dewpoints of 37 along with light winds gave it that opportunity.

It is no surprise to those of us following and posting the dailies that the RONI equivalent for last week rose 0.4 to +0.1, the largest weekly gain since the week centered on 5/31/23, which warmed 0.5. Other regions also warmed with a warming of 0.4 in both Nino 3 and Nino 4 while 1+2 warmed by 0.2: 08APR2026 1.0 -0.2 -0.3 0.2 15APR2026 1.2 0.2 0.1 0.6 How does the +0.1 compare to 2015, 1997, and 1982 in mid April? - 2015: +1.0 but it had a head start - 1997: +0.3 - 1982: +0.3 https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/data/indices/rel_wksst9120.txt

Today’s Euro Weeklies run is the wettest yet for the SE as a whole for Apr 27-May 3rd with ~1.25-1.75” over much of the area! And as an added bonus, the subsequent week (May 4-10) has a bit of a wetter signal than prior runs had:

Thanks, snowman. Keep in mind that Paul is comparing to 1997, when global temps were significantly cooler.

Impressive -NAO on the way: