January 2020 General Discussions & Observations Thread

[gravitylover]

15 here.

[hudsonvalley21]

18 here 

[binbisso]

http://<img src="https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/ensplume_small.gif" alt="GFS MJO index ensemble plume"/>

 

changes continue for mjo.

edit: can someone explain how to insert images to my posts

[Brian5671]

actually feels like January with a low of 19 here.   Upton going for 62 here Sunday!

[bluewave]

30 minutes ago, binbisso said:

http://<img src="https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/ensplume_small.gif" alt="GFS MJO index ensemble plume"/>

 

changes continue for mjo.

edit: can someone explain how to insert images to my posts

The GEFS has one of the most amplified  phase 4-7 transits that we have seen in January. Gets over to phase 7 around January 20th. So a more -EPO gradient  pattern potentially emerging between the 20th and 24th. Would probably be around February 1st that the MJO gets closer to phase 8.
 

 

[Brian5671]

11 minutes ago, bluewave said:

The GEFS has one of the most amplified  phase 4-7 transits that we have seen in January. Gets over to phase 7 around January 20th. So a more -EPO gradient  pattern potentially emerging between the 20th and 24th. Would probably be around February 1st that the MJO gets closer to phase 8.
 

 

I would think we could see a crazy storm (liquid or frozen) somewhere with this???

[Allsnow]

11 minutes ago, Brian5671 said:

I would think we could see a crazy storm (liquid or frozen) somewhere with this???

Depends on where the boundary sets up. But yes, like we been seeing all winter, we would have very wet systems with cold air near by. 

[Allsnow]

2 hours ago, bluewave said:

Thanks for posting. A stronger  phase 7 could set up a -EPO gradient pattern in late January. 
 

 

Great call with the wave 6 amplitude. What was the reason for this? 

[PB-99]

12 hours ago, tombo82685 said:

False and false.

There is a complete atmospheric journal on slow and fast mjo and also the lag each response has

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/MWR-D-16-0352.1

and here is the cpc website that shows composite lag of each

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/LaggedComposites/description.shtml

 

I will try and answer this the best I can as I see that some others may have  missed that " lag " and " slowing " argument Snoski was referring as well.  

The poster opined that the return of colder weather would be around Feb 15 which is a full 20 days later than the guidance wss/is showing, so first lets address what "lag" he was speaking about.  I posted this yesterday, 

"  we will be heading into 7 and then into p8 as I have been posting in here since last Thursday. At that time the MJO Rimm plots were trying to fade the MJO back around into the COD and the concerns at  that time  ( not you ) was that were going to circle back to into p4/5/6 because of the warm water N of Australia. 

That was easily pegged as garbage and tossed aside. 

 

Now p7 doesn`t bring the trough into the east out body and soul in fact it`s trough is probably just east of the Rockies but I think what people kept missing was that the Neg the EPS was ejecting wasn`t some pig pac poorly sourced negative that once east of the Rockies would just end up down sloping warm PAC air in the east.

Typically they are, that`s why p7 isn`t BN and one would have to wait for the typical p8 response. However and another silly argument by some ( again not you ) was what that there had to be " a lag ", again that was also pointed out as garbage because that piece of the TPV the EPS ejects is real LLC air and that undercuts the ridge starting on d9, you can see that as the 0 line is down in N/C , by day 15 it`s in S/C "

 

. 

 

I will use yesterday`s 0z z run as it was what I was discussing. Take a look at how fast the TPV  ejects, it`s into the lakes in 3 days.

We are prob heading away from p6 by this time, but as the forcing moves east that TPV just needed a nudge and it comes. 

And then it continues through the period. 

 

 

Take a look at how fast that ridge gets pushed on. By this time the actual 0 line is NC.

 

So when referring to the " lag " that he was referring to. Typically in p4/5/6 N America would be torched so heading into p7 YES you would need to wait ( lag ) before you recycled the PAC NW. But as I pointed out, what is sitting in the PAC NW changes the speed at which you will see the effects E of the Rockies. And my point over the last week in here has been to target the MJO returning to p8 by months end and return to a more N winter regime around the 20th as we head towards p7.

And I can assure you there were not many takers in here.

 

 

 

The next point is the " slowing " of the MJO  We were not discussing the deceleration in p6, as that is seen in the RIMM plots. 

One only needs to go back a little further and see the BS loop the GEFSBC was advertising which had some of the posters opining how the MJO was going to loop back into 4/5/6 " because of the plus 32c water N of Australia.

That was the " slowing" that I had to stick aside.

I posted a week ago that the CFS made the most sense as it matched the Roundy plots and I expected this go into p7 and then p8 before Jan is up.

 

 

 

Here is what yesterday`s GFSBC corrected too and is where I think we are going.

 

Again, the " slowing " was not the actual wave, the poster thought we would loop back and we do not. So here is where I think  we are going and have been on this for a week in here.

 

 

So in closing we are speaking about 2 different slowings and lagging is all. 

The conclusion by me is that the CFS RIMM/Roundy plots/2 week verification correction between the GFS/GEFS will be right. We head into p7 and that will kick a very well sourced piece of the TPV east and the SE ridge and Torch will begin to get blunted by day 9 

 

 

 

[Allsnow]

Euro now into p7 on the rmm plots. 

[frd]

59 minutes ago, bluewave said:

The GEFS has one of the most amplified  phase 4-7 transits that we have seen in January. Gets over to phase 7 around January 20th. So a more -EPO gradient  pattern potentially emerging between the 20th and 24th. Would probably be around February 1st that the MJO gets closer to phase 8.
 

@bluewave simply in terms of modeling do you have stats or a personal favorite when it comes to predicting the MJO.

What model tends to do best?

As, I  know there are many.  

[snowman19]

1 hour ago, bluewave said:

The GEFS has one of the most amplified  phase 4-7 transits that we have seen in January. Gets over to phase 7 around January 20th. So a more -EPO gradient  pattern potentially emerging between the 20th and 24th. Would probably be around February 1st that the MJO gets closer to phase 8.
 

 

Looks like I was too slow with my thoughts on the colder regime. Post 1/20 looks good for colder and yea, assuming the models are correct and the MJO propagates into phase 8 come 2/1 or thereabouts, I think the question then becomes is this a “locked in” (all of February to mid-March 40+ day) change to colder and blocked or is it back to a mild regime, a la the Euro weeklies? 

[Brian5671]

1 minute ago, snowman19 said:

Looks like I was too slow with my thoughts on the colder regime. Post 1/20 looks good for colder and yea, assuming the models are correct and the MJO propagates into phase 8 come 2/1 or thereabouts, I think the question then becomes is this a “locked in” (all of February to mid-March 40+ day) change to colder and blocked or is it back to a mild regime, a la the Euro weeklies? 

Weeklies have been horrid last 2 years, so I would toss them even if it showed a 95-96 pattern.   Last year it showed that every run for the LR and it never came.

[snowman19]

3 minutes ago, Brian5671 said:

Weeklies have been horrid last 2 years, so I would toss them even if it showed a 95-96 pattern.   Last year it showed that every run for the LR and it never came.

Based on how the pattern has been progressing since November, just my opinion, I have a hard time believing that we lock in a real cold, blocked up pattern for 6 weeks straight (2/1 - 3/15). Could I be wrong? Yep and stranger things have happened but I definitely would not bet on such a scenario happening given where we just came from

[Brian5671]

1 minute ago, snowman19 said:

Based on how the pattern has been progressing since November, just my opinion, I have a hard time believing that we lock in a real cold, blocked up pattern for 6 weeks straight (2/1 - 3/15). Could I be wrong? Yep and stranger things have happened but I definitely would not bet on such a scenario happening given where we just came from

Always true, however there is history, 06-07 when from blowtorch to freezer for the 2nd half.  89-90 was freezer to blowtorch.    So it's on the table.   But I agree, there's nothing at present to show that.

[HeadInTheClouds]

2 hours ago, snowman19 said:

If it does get colder on 1/20, that doesn’t cancel out the previous 3 weeks of warmth for this month. The last week of January won’t salvage this month lol

He didn't say anything about that. He said that maybe people shouldn't have talked like the winter was over and the patio furniture was coming out when the calendar changed to 2020. 

[tombo82685]

19 minutes ago, frd said:

@bluewave simply in terms of modeling do you have stats or a personal favorite when it comes to predicting the MJO.

What model tends to do best?

As, I  know there are many.  

Roundy’s hovmoeller diagrams of unfiltered and projected anomalies are the best I’ve seen 

[bluewave]

59 minutes ago, Allsnow said:

Great call with the wave 6 amplitude. What was the reason for this? 

I just remember the paper getting posted on twitter a few years ago when the EPS was showing too weak a phase 6. 

https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00480.1?mobileUi=0

show the composite maps for the forecasts initialized with the strong MJO in phase 5. This is the phase in which VarEPS shows the largest difference between the predictability and prediction skill, while CFSv2 has relatively better prediction skill (Fig. 7). The skill difference between the two systems mainly results from the wind field. The VarEPS does not predict the propagation signal, while CFSv2 predicts the amplitude realistically with propagation of zonal wind field anomaly.

 

 

[SnowGoose69]

37 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

Looks like I was too slow with my thoughts on the colder regime. Post 1/20 looks good for colder and yea, assuming the models are correct and the MJO propagates into phase 8 come 2/1 or thereabouts, I think the question then becomes is this a “locked in” (all of February to mid-March 40+ day) change to colder and blocked or is it back to a mild regime, a la the Euro weeklies? 

In the absence of strong ENSO the Pac state from December has a tendency to resurface in February.  Notice how last two winters the chit pattern from most of December with the SE ridge dominated February as well.  It doesn’t necessarily mean the resultant weather will be the same because you could have a GOA low in Dec/Feb but in Feb the NAO is negative and mitigates it.  That said this December the Pac was pretty good first 18 days of month.  If we revert back to that idea in February we won’t do too poorly.  

[PB-99]

39 minutes ago, snowman19 said:

Based on how the pattern has been progressing since November, just my opinion, I have a hard time believing that we lock in a real cold, blocked up pattern for 6 weeks straight (2/1 - 3/15). Could I be wrong? Yep and stranger things have happened but I definitely would not bet on such a scenario happening given where we just came from

 

You typically don`t run " 6 straight weeks of cold " and I wouldn`t expect that either.

 

But when you total up Jan 20 - March 20 , you may likely find that was your winter. 

[SnowGoose69]

3 minutes ago, PB-99 said:

 

You typically don`t run " 6 straight weeks of cold " and I wouldn`t expect that either.

 

But when you total up Jan 20 - March 20 , you will likely find that was your winter. 

In general for both summer and winter the magical flip period if you’ve been stuck in one sort of regime is 7/25 or 1/25.  If you don’t see it by then it rarely happens.  We’ve seen it on the flip side with summer in years such as 2001 or 2002 but look at 2000 and 2003.  2003 finally got warm around 8/10 or so but it lasted all of 10 days and we flipped right back again.  It’s why once you reach 2/1-2/5 and have seen so big change it’s rarely coming and if you do it’s brief 

[PB-99]

42 minutes ago, SnowGoose69 said:

In general for both summer and winter the magical flip period if you’ve been stuck in one sort of regime is 7/25 or 1/25.  If you don’t see it by then it rarely happens.  We’ve seen it on the flip side with summer in years such as 2001 or 2002 but look at 2000 and 2003.  2003 finally got warm around 8/10 or so but it lasted all of 10 days and we flipped right back again.  It’s why once you reach 2/1-2/5 and have seen so big change it’s rarely coming and if you do it’s brief 

 

1st real transient shot comes back on the 16th now.

 

Chops up the warm up. 

 

[PB-99]

 

 

[PB-99]

This one is probably not transient 

 

Jan 20 target date

 

 

[bluewave]

The bulk of our seasonal snowfall usually comes after January 19th. Just goes to show what an extreme outlier the 10-11 winter was.

NYC snowfall 

............By January 19th......After January 19th

18-19....7.1......13.4

17-18....17.9....23.0

16-17....10.1....20.1

15-16....0.4......32.4

14-15....3.7......46.6

13-14....15.0....42.4

12-13....5.1.....21.0

11-12....2.9.....4.5

10-11...31.9....30.0

09-10....13.2...38.2

•  

[uncle W]

there have been winters when most of the snow that fell came in a 30 day period...some of them had one big storm that made it acceptable...

winter...…….snowfall...….30 day snowfall......big snow.....

1875-76...…….18.3"...……………..14.8"...……………..11.0"...Feb...

1920-21...…….18.6"...……………..15.1"...……………..12.5"...Feb...

1946-47...…….30.6"...……………..23.2"...……………..10.7"...Feb...

1968-69...…….30.2"...……………..22.2"...……………..15.3"...Feb...

1978-79...…….29.4"...……………..20.1"...……………..12.7"...Feb...

1982-83...…….27.2"...……………..23.4"...……………..17.6"...Feb...

1992-93...…….24.5"...……………..19.5"...……………..10.6"...Mar...

2015-16...…….32.8"...……………..31.9"...……………..27.5"...Jan...

seven of the eight years had a major storm in February or March...2016 had one in late Jan...1994-95 had 0.2" going into Feb and Feb had a big storm...last winter 13" of the 20.5" came in late Feb and early March...

[PB-99]

So what`s left of the real warm up is Jan 10 - Jan 16 and then the GFS fades it away. 

 

That is a much quicker flip on the GFS than even I expected if that`s right.  

[nycwinter]

12 minutes ago, bluewave said:

The bulk of our seasonal snowfall usually comes after January 19th. Just goes to show what an extreme outlier the 10-11 winter was.

NYC snowfall 

............By January 19th......After January 19th

18-19....7.1......13.4

17-18....17.9....23.0

16-17....10.1....20.1

15-16....0.4......32.4

14-15....3.7......46.6

13-14....15.0....42.4

12-13....5.1.....21.0

11-12....2.9.....4.5

10-11...31.9....30.0

09-10....13.2...38.2

•  

so the history of nyc snow is only since 2010 according to your post..we have had plenty of big snowstorms before jan 19.....we have had 13 snowstorms of a foot or more of snow before jan 19 and one day which i did not add happened on jan 19-20..

[MJO812]

Alot of chances on the gfs

[PB-99]

9 minutes ago, nycwinter said:

so the history of nyc snow is only since 2010 according to your post..we have had plenty of big snowstorms before jan 19.....we have had 13 snowstorms of a foot or more of snow before jan 19 and one day which i did not add happened on jan 19-20..

 

There are more 6 inch snowstorms at KNYC in March than in December.

There is plenty of winter ahead.