Texas/New Mexico/Louisiana/Mexico Obs And Discussion Thread Part 8

[cstrunk]

5 hours ago, Roy said:

This thread is basically dead, but will say I am looking forward to some rain finally it appears next week. Just hope it gets this far east. Looks like a pretty heavy concentration from AUS to Amarillo.

Yeah, me too. We haven't head any meaningful rain in my part of East Texas for about a month.

[raindancewx]

Am I crazy for thinking we might be entering a Dustbowl redux?

Last winter (2016-17) was very similar to 1931-32 by temperature anomalies nationally. This (2017) Hurricane season is the only one since 1850, other than 1932 - to have a category four hurricane hit Florida, Texas and Puerto Rico in the same season. The PDO, Nino 3.4 (raw) temperatures, AMO (raw) temperatures, and solar activity are all almost identical to 1932 right now. To me, the Dustbowl started after how dry / warm the 1932-33 winter was for much of the Midwest. 

PDO: Aug 1932: -0.1. Aug 2017: +0.1

AMO: Aug 1932: 23.51C, Aug 2017: 23.66C

Sunspots July-June: 1932-33: 14.5

               July-June 2017-18: 18.0?

Other: Both years two years after Super (Modoki) El Ninos:  1930/2015

Look at how close Nino 3.4 is for August 2017 & August 1932 too - https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKS8WhyVAAAb3KN.jpg:large

 

[Chinook]

Texas/New Mexico may get a bit of rain

[raindancewx]

WPC on board too

 

[aggiegeog]

East of I-35 will have typical late summer weather, though a small cool down for the weekend. West of I-35 looks very wet and cool. This system should produce some decent snow on the high peaks in NM and Southern CO. Only about 6 weeks until ski season in NM.

[Roy]

Does DFW have any good years with La Nina? I am basically thinking that's going to kill winter and if it lingers lead to drought next year, but sometimes you can get good cold out of it at times. 

We are getting screwed on the rain though after it looked promising last week.

[raindancewx]

4 hours ago, Roy said:

Does DFW have any good years with La Nina? I am basically thinking that's going to kill winter and if it lingers lead to drought next year, but sometimes you can get good cold out of it at times. 

We are getting screwed on the rain though after it looked promising last week.

1938-39 was cold in TX (La Nina), same for 1983-84, and 1984-85, 2000-01

1974-75 wasn't bad

1988-89 wasn't bad

2010-11 wasn't bad

Some of the near La Ninas (cold-Neutrals) seem pretty cold in TX actually (1932, 1937, 1944, 1947, 1948, 1962, 1967, 1985, 1996, 2012, 2013)

[Roy]

I think back and when I was still living in West TX some La Nina years were decent. Heck, I just checked and actually for the top 10 daily snow record events at MAF, none were in El Nino years. Five were La Nina and 5 neutral. Looking at January snowfall monthly records, only two of the top 10 were El Nino years. Pretty good case that out there at least La Nina can be good for snow. 

I just looked at DFW, and the daily records at least were heavily favored toward neutral years with nearly double the number of El Nino and La Nina combined, but El Nino had two more than La Nina, though nothing too significant there really. I only had time to look at daily records there.

[raindancewx]

I've had at least 0.64" rain today, one of the biggest precipitation days of the year here. Basically 48-50F from 6 pm to 9 pm with steady rain. Feels great actually.

I had a wet September in my Summer outlook (from mid-May). Looks pretty good now if the NAM is right about the city getting another 0.6"-1.2" rain by Sept 30. I think I had 1.25", and we're at 0.74" right now. The link has the newest NAM outlook through 9/30/17.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DKx3ktNU8AE9-V2.jpg:large

Will be issuing my winter outlook (snow and DJF temps) sometime between Oct 7 - 15. I'll link it on here if anyone is curious.

[radarman]

On 9/26/2017 at 1:27 PM, Roy said:

Does DFW have any good years with La Nina? I am basically thinking that's going to kill winter and if it lingers lead to drought next year, but sometimes you can get good cold out of it at times. 

We are getting screwed on the rain though after it looked promising last week.

some decent and much needed rainfall this afternoon and evening in parts of the metroplex.  Ft Worth got in on it earlier.  Grapevine and Irving on the north side of DFW airport had nuisance level street flooding.  Even Garland and Mesquite had a nice cell move through.  We'll take it at any rate.

[Roy]

Got about an inch yesterday and today in my area of north Ft. Worth. I'll take it. 

[Rugun]

Talk to me!! How's the winter forecast looking for Louisiana? Cold, wet, dry? I know we need some rain, I hate mowing 3 acres in a dust bowl.

[raindancewx]

8 hours ago, Rugun said:

Talk to me!! How's the winter forecast looking for Louisiana? Cold, wet, dry? I know we need some rain, I hate mowing 3 acres in a dust bowl.

Pretty sure it will be warm in Louisiana for the winter, but a lot cooler than last winter. None of that +6F to +8F garbage like last year.  Maybe +1 to +3F? I have to re-do my simulations with the heavy rain we've gotten in TX/NM lately. The soil moisture does seem to impact the placement of the highs some.

I think effectively there is something of a wake in zone where the sub tropical high will be because of Harvey, Irma, Jose, Katia, and Maria beating the day lights out of it and upwelling some colder ocean temperatures. My area is colder (not actually, you know cold) in La Nina winters that follow relatively long duration periods of heat. We've had (at least) 96 days 87F or higher, that tends to lead to near normal temperatures here. My area is colder (not actually cold) in La Nina winters when the Atlantic is cooler. My area also has exceptionally variable winters near the solar minimum - record heat / record cold are all near the minimum. Barring a complete bust over the next two days for highs, these years were the objective analogs that popped up for winter based on my Summer conditions - its heavily weighted to temps and preicp with low weight to ENSO. This is one method I use to look at winter - I'll give it some weight, but it isn't my forecast.

The big big wild card for the winter especially late is if Mount Agung or one of these other suddenly active Ring of Fire volcanoes is going to erupt in a big way soon enough to screw up the Earth's heat intake.

[cstrunk]

I'm about to start resorting to nightly rain-dances so I can get some appreciable rain IMBY. We got about 0.20"-0.25" last week, and maybe 0.10" from Harvey. The last decent rain was within a week or so before Harvey came ashore. About a month and a half ago. 

[aggiegeog]

3 hours ago, cstrunk said:

I'm about to start resorting to nightly rain-dances so I can get some appreciable rain IMBY. We got about 0.20"-0.25" last week, and maybe 0.10" from Harvey. The last decent rain was within a week or so before Harvey came ashore. About a month and a half ago. 

It sure has been dry. At least I got nearly an inch last week though none from Harvey.

The cool weather is very nice though, I could see mid 40s tonight.

[raindancewx]

I'm somewhat optimistic for a cooler winter than last year for the SW & SE - in my area two big early predictors both favor less warmth - the number of 87F days (we had 96!) and the AMO in July to Sept. AMO in July to Sept was 0.325 or so. Last year, 0.460. That's worth around half a degree of cooling. The increase in 87F days, fro 83 to 96, is worth about a degree of cooling. Expecting the winter here to be around 49.6F, +/-2.2F. Will put up my winter outlook tomorrow.

[raindancewx]

We've had some really nice days here lately - down to the 30s the other night, with highs in the 60s, and then low 70s today.

Some of you seem interested in skiing, and others talk about "snow fixes" so I included some snow data for the high country in winter outlook if any of you are interested. I'm expecting a pretty decent season up by Chama & Red River against their long-term averages.

https://tinyurl.com/yam55n95

[aggiegeog]

Keeping an eye out for a possible, if unlikely, 1993 late October setup. Anyone up for some October snowflakes and freezing temps?

[DFWWeather]

1 hour ago, aggiegeog said:

Keeping an eye out for a possible, if unlikely, 1993 late October setup. Anyone up for some October snowflakes and freezing temps?

Glad you brought this up! I've been looking at the same data. Ironically, ECMWF doesn't seem to be quite on board yet with a more slanted trough east of us driving the core of the cold east, which has me very cautious. However, CMC and GFS have been gung-ho about a big cold air outbreak the weekend of the 28th for several runs now as with many ensemble members. Generally, all of next week should be the coolest of this October with the potential of 3 fronts, one this weekend, one about Tuesday, and potential big one the last weekend of the month. All of this will of course be driven by the potential recurve of what should be a super typhoon toward Japan in Pacific. This typhoon should recurve because of the record phase 5 MJO. In fact, the recurve should be a lock! This will drive the 500mb pattern change over North America. Regarding precip chances with this, much too early to tell, I'm not sure on the pattern quite yet.

[cheese007]

I'm ready for any flakes at all after the last couple winters. I'd be ecstatic for an inch 

[raindancewx]

I have the West pretty warm in Nov, but should be fairly cold TX to ND and east.

[radarman]

On 10/11/2017 at 7:01 PM, raindancewx said:

We've had some really nice days here lately - down to the 30s the other night, with highs in the 60s, and then low 70s today.

Some of you seem interested in skiing, and others talk about "snow fixes" so I included some snow data for the high country in winter outlook if any of you are interested. I'm expecting a pretty decent season up by Chama & Red River against their long-term averages.

https://tinyurl.com/yam55n95

nice job, and GL

As an aside, hiked Mt. Wheeler on 10/1... snow began to appear around 11.4k', ramped up sharply above about 12.2k'.  Stray post holes might swallow up your whole leg in places... And the wind was out of control near the peak as the late Sept trough finally ejected..  Beautiful, incredible place. 

[raindancewx]

36 minutes ago, radarman said:

nice job, and GL

As an aside, hiked Mt. Wheeler on 10/1... snow began to appear around 11.4k', ramped up sharply above about 12.2k'.  Stray post holes might swallow up your whole leg in places... And the wind was out of control near the peak as the late Sept trough finally ejected..  Beautiful, incredible place. 

Even in populated areas of New Mexico it can occasionally snow in June & September. Snow is favored precip time above 7,000 feet or so from October to May. Nice pics. Was hoping for some snow in the city this October, but not looking likely. It only happens once a decade though. Suspect my forecast will do OK, with some issues, something always comes up. Last year it was pretty good for January nationally, less so Dec/Feb. As far as I know New Mexico doesn't have any glaciers, the permanent snow/ice line here would be like 15,000 feet above sea level, but obviously the big time mountains get close - I think July is really the issue - even at 13,000 feet its rarely cold enough to snow here in July.

"Beautiful Incredible Place" is how I'd describe most of New Mexico really. If you're back by June you will be able to see the white stuff on the higher peaks. Mountains will keep getting snow into mid to late May most years. Even in the city we had an inch of snow in some areas on April 29th this year. The volcanoes (5800 feet) outside the city were the lushest I had ever seen them a few days after it melted, covered in beautiful green grasses, flowers, mud, and wildlife.

[aggiegeog]

50 minutes ago, radarman said:

nice job, and GL

As an aside, hiked Mt. Wheeler on 10/1... snow began to appear around 11.4k', ramped up sharply above about 12.2k'.  Stray post holes might swallow up your whole leg in places... And the wind was out of control near the peak as the late Sept trough finally ejected..  Beautiful, incredible place. 

I was hoping to make it up this fall but it never worked out. My grandparents were up at our place around that time and they reported days around 45 with lots of rain, very unusual for October. I expected that the peaks were being dumped on. I expect the NE quarter of NM to be pretty interesting this winter from developing Panhandle lows forming on the typical strong La Nina fronts. Not sure the rest of NM will see much as the eastern Pacific is very cool so not many SW cutoffs. i bet we will see the return of some significant dust storms this winter after things dry out from a wet fall.

[aggiegeog]

18 minutes ago, raindancewx said:

Even in populated areas of New Mexico it can occasionally snow in June & September. Snow is favored precip time above 7,000 feet or so from October to May. Nice pics. Was hoping for some snow in the city this October, but not looking likely. It only happens once a decade though. Suspect my forecast will do OK, with some issues, something always comes up. Last year it was pretty good for January nationally, less so Dec/Feb. As far as I know New Mexico doesn't have any glaciers, the permanent snow/ice line here would be like 15,000 feet above sea level, but obviously the big time mountains get close - I think July is really the issue - even at 13,000 feet its rarely cold enough to snow here in July.

"Beautiful Incredible Place" is how I'd describe most of New Mexico really. If you're back by June you will be able to see the white stuff on the higher peaks. Mountains will keep getting snow into mid to late May most years. Even in the city we had an inch of snow in some areas on April 29th this year. The volcanoes (5800 feet) outside the city were the lushest I had ever seen them a few days after it melted, covered in beautiful green grasses, flowers, mud, and wildlife.

My family's place (around 9k feet near on Highway 518) sees snow fall most years from mid to late Oct through mid May with snow on the ground consistently most years from TDay through mid April. February through mid March are peak with snow depths generally >3 feet and sometimes much deeper. Above 10,500 feet snow holds on though mid June usually. I have learned to quit trying to hike until July up high.

[aggiegeog]

I like what I am seeing in regards to a possible Arctic (October version at least) outbreak next weekend. Looks like the typhoon remnants will pump up the GoA ridge which could bring many their first frost, maybe snow down to I-40. Still have to watch to make sure the West Coast ridge stays off of the Cali coast or we risk the cold sliding east.

[raindancewx]

I don't have much faith in the CFS this early, but it continues to insist on a dry NW for the winter...AND a La Nina.

[cstrunk]

I ended up with almost an inch of rain from last night's squall line. It was windy enough to wake me up, but there was only a little bit of lightning and thunder. 

We desperately needed that. 

[aggiegeog]

We are still on track for an Arctic intrusion on Friday with temps steady in the 50s, would not be a shock if temps were even cooler though. Saturady looks like 50s for highs and Sunday morning will likely be the coldest with a decent chance at a frost for many, if we get good radiational cooling maybe a freeze in spots.

[aggiegeog]

The Gulf of Alaska is set up for a cool to cold November. Hopefully that is the pattern for the whole winter season.