Winter 2020-2021

[WinterWolf]

3 hours ago, Damage In Tolland said:

Nothing showed that last winter. Either you were cocked or your monitor was upside down when you were reading winter outlooks 

It sure did show that last year Lol, but ok “Twister in Tolland.”  
 

And the only thing upside down, are your ideas.

 

 

 

[Snowcrazed71]

4 hours ago, WinterWolf said:

It sure did show that last year Lol, but ok “Twister in Tolland.”  
 

And the only thing upside down, are your ideas.

 

 

 

As I said before....Last year turned out completely opposite than what was expected. Our local MET's in Connecticut all had the same forecasts for the winter.... Snowy and colder. But..what ruined it was the positive NAO. It was so strong that it never let the cold air come down to the U.S.. Poeple are gun-shy and bitter from what happened last year. Ok, there is hope that we can have a better Winter here in the Northeast, but, even I have my hesitations ( althoigh I'm not totally off it being a decent Winter here in SNE either ). The excitement is still there for me ( as it allways had been for my 48 years of life ), when it comes to the weather. It's always throwing out a curve ball.  I'm hopeful we will get that curve ball thrown at us, all it takes is that " ONE " storm. So for those of you who are bitter and have lost that excitment and hope..... Breathe and wait. Something is bound to happen that will suck you all back in. 

[SJonesWX]

12 hours ago, Damage In Tolland said:

Uh- oh. Hope everyone is prepping for rat  of rats 

 

I don’t get what that Phil guy is saying. the reddish brown color says below normal snowfall according to the map legend. below normal does not equal bare ground.

[OSUmetstud]

33 minutes ago, SJonesWX said:

I don’t get what that Phil guy is saying. the reddish brown color says below normal snowfall according to the map legend. below normal does not equal bare ground.

It does in Cape Cod. 

Warmer than normal temperatures and below normal snow = lots of bare ground in places that don't retain snow well anyway.

[Hoth]

9 hours ago, WinterWolf said:

It sure did show that last year Lol, but ok “Twister in Tolland.”  
 

And the only thing upside down, are your ideas.

 

 

 

Yeah we all had wood over the look last fall. After back to back Modoki fake out seasons, that word is now on my Fraud Five list.

[40/70 Benchmark]

32 minutes ago, OSUmetstud said:

It does in Cape Cod. 

Warmer than normal temperatures and below normal snow = lots of bare ground in places that don't retain snow well anyway.

Yea, always remain mindful a poster's location when considering their perspective. The first thing that I thought of after reading that was "well, you live on the cape, dude". lol

 

[40/70 Benchmark]

3 minutes ago, Hoth said:

Yeah we all had wood over the look last fall. After back to back Modoki fake out seasons, that word is now on my Fraud Five list.

That mentality is silly. Its not a fraud 5...its very valid. I mean, the previous two modoki seasons prior to these past two duds were 2004-2005 and 2014-2015....2009-2010 also, but the strength of it made the STJ a bit too prevalent for us.

Short memory.

[40/70 Benchmark]

There are no absolute correlations. There is no index that is always going to work out in the favored manner...not within a realm as a chaotic as the earth's atmosphere. There are too many other variables at play.

2007-2008 and 2014-2015 were great...hope we pull off another +NAO!

The frame of mind should not be "modoki, HUGE snows...or +NAO, see you next year.".....but rather, there is a modoki, so I like my chances"....or "The NAO will likely be positive, so there is less margin for error".

[Hoth]

1 minute ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

That mentality is silly. Its not a fraud 5...its very valid. I mean, the previous two modoki seasons prior to these past two duds were 2004-2005 and 2014-2015....2009-2010 also, but the strength of it made the STJ a bit too prevalent for us.

Short memory.

Pain is a powerful teacher, more so than pleasure sadly. The last few seasons still hurt acutely, while 2004-05 and 2014-15 are just pockets of warmth in the recesses of memory.

[40/70 Benchmark]

Just now, Hoth said:

Pain is a powerful teacher, more so than pleasure sadly. The last few seasons still hurt acutely, while 2004-05 and 2014-15 are just pockets of warmth in the recesses of memory.

I get it, but we were due for some bad modoki karma.

[40/70 Benchmark]

12 hours ago, raindancewx said:

The Jamstec has in October 2020 what it forecast in October 2016 for 2016-17, and that ended up a cold NW winter, which I take as a decent sign for my outlook. I did look - the Oct correlation for the NAO v. DJF disappears even on the "after El Nino years" thing I did before since 1990 or 2000, although it is less than 10 years since 2000 and not a good way to use correlations at that point. Once the coming cold dumps into the NW, this October will probably to look a lot like the composite of some of the prior Octobers following two El Ninos ahead of a cold ENSO winter. 

April/May are actually better at predicting the NAO in winter than October is, despite how far out they are. We had a -NAO in April this year for the first time in forever, so that makes it unlikely to me that recent years would be super similar.

I'm surprised that this comment did not garner more attention. I think it is very significant. While I believe that the DM NAO will once again average positive, I agree that it should evolve differently from some of the recent hostility in that region.

[CoastalWx]

How would April and May be better predicting the NAO? I don't understand that logic. To me, that is more of a product of late winter strat warming, where we are in QBO ascension, descension, and also ENSO state.

[40/70 Benchmark]

2 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

How would April and May be better predicting the NAO? I don't understand that logic. To me, that is more of a product of late winter strat warming, where we are in QBO ascension, descension, and also ENSO state.

The subsurface...I will have to dig up Chuck's research when I get a chance, but something along the lines of the summer subsurface resurfacing in winter. I think that is the origin of the correlation.

[CoastalWx]

27 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

The subsurface...I will have to dig up Chuck's research when I get a chance, but something along the lines of the summer subsurface resurfacing in winter. I think that is the origin of the correlation.

Thanks, yeah I'm not saying there isn't...just trying to understand how that could be. 

[40/70 Benchmark]

Just now, CoastalWx said:

Thanks, yeah I'm not saying there isn't...just trying to understand how that could be. 

I used it in one of my outlooks. l'll grab it.

[Typhoon Tip]

1 hour ago, Hoth said:

Yeah we all had wood over the look last fall. After back to back Modoki fake out seasons, that word is now on my Fraud Five list.

Maybe it is because the ENSO SST distribution is no longer AS usurping as it used to be in the total integrated machinery of the planetary circulation result.  As an extension ... and possible connection to GW, coincidences suck in physics... usually, there's causality connection; and it appears more so than merely coincidence that recent ENSO events, having not been registering as impactful along/at normal climate pathways as they were prior to the recent empirically proven GW acceleration ..., is just such an annoying coincidence ...which by the way, the advent of those failures has been concurrent with recency -

My hypothesis is that the expansion of the tropical/subtropics found here : https://science2017.globalchange.gov/chapter/5/    ... is at least partial in that causality connection.

The longer version:    The idea of that expansion  of the HC isn't my personal work - so ...maybe start considering that ( not you personally but in general - ).  But, changing the previous ocean-atmospheric modal exchange is as good as any initial educated/existentially rooted guess. It's just to gin up a scientific discussion if not actually process therein, to formulating theory as any I've heard... Which, unfortunately ...isn't a lot - and I admit to that frustrating me.  These are non-arbitrary substantive observations being made by a much larger bevy of sources other than that just being made by me ...

A ... flows toward B.  There's a gap between just being statistically/numerically reliant, and understanding that gradient is everything in Universe.  If there is no movement of A --> B ...entropy is infinite and there is nothing?  This isn't mere philosophy.  All actions and our ability to sense " reality" itself, are because of cause and effects an essentially infinite solution of forces attempting to get to a rest state...  That includes both why the wind blows, and... one's ability to sense the wind blowing.  This adolescent truism seems to escape us when it comes to the teleconnectors and the statistics;  when we assume +1 NAO means this in the atmosphere for us, that sort of unwittingly acts as though that +1 is a force in itself. It's not. It's a result over time then averaged. But the nature of A is no longer stable. And that changes  how A moves toward B ... That change = seasonal forecast pieces of shit for not seeing it.   

SO... tfwiw - ... If the HC band expands above the previous interface of the ENSO ocean-atmospheric coupled region, that is a whopper change in how A relates to B ( which in the context, 'B' refers to the domain outside the ENSO o/a realm)  ..

It's like ( haha ) a stable marriage.  It's runnin' along fine, but then B becomes an alcoholic ... an abusive one at that... Meanwhile A is still doing what A always did ( in this metaphor, oscillating between warm(cool) phases of ENSO), but the changes in B ... means the nature of the marriage has changed - what we do when we ignore expanding HCs and GW and all this shit ...is we assume that B can be an abusive asshole alcoholic and it won't change the nature of their relationship.   WRONG

I admit to having noticed gradient saturation and higher velocities/R-wave stretching and progressive patterning bias over the last 15 to 20 years as becoming more discerned over the course ... but, this science publication above shows that said reality outside of said frame, is ALSO onto this - and you should be too   This regressive reliance is not showing evolution or learning ... I realize that's hard to do in a pathology that is hardened across generations of other consistencies...but therein is the problem.  We've lost the consistency -  

I don't intend this to be an admonishment ...

people really need to start questioning the % forcing capacitance of the ENSO's longer duration oceanic-atmospheric coupled teleconnector when gradient changes how it integrates.

 

[CoastalWx]

Tip should get a tattoo of a giant 500mb ridge with teeth and bulging, blood shot eyes just devouring the NAMR continent.  

[40/70 Benchmark]

16 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Thanks, yeah I'm not saying there isn't...just trying to understand how that could be. 

"StormchaserChuck" devised a formula roughly a decade ago that predicts the mean aggregate state of the NAO for the ensuing winter using the SSTs in an area of the north Atlantic. We strongly endorse this methodology as the most accurate predictor available for the mean state of the winter NAO.

The following methodology is a wonderful illustration of the delayed feedback between sea and air that represents the very essence of the elaborate system of atmospheric oscillations that we so often reference.

"In 2006 on a site called easternuswx, elaborate research was done with North Atlantic SSTs, showing high lagging

 predictive value for following Winter's NAO/AO. The correlation factor was higher than 0.4, and there was advantage

 over decadal cycles. Meaning, it would predict years that reversed the decadal trend. The index was very accurate in

 predicting the +NAO for the 2006-2007 Winter, and got much attention after a topic called "This will be the warmest

 Winter on record for the US" (It was 7).  Since then the index has performed wonderfully after the fact:

2016-17: Strong - NAO signal/ Weak -NAO Winter  .. Yes

2015-16: +NAO signal/ +NAO Winter ... Yes

2014-15: Strong - NAO signal / +NAO Winter ... No

2013-14: Strong +NAO signal / +NAO Winter ... Yes
2012-13: slight -NAO signal / strong -NAO Winter ... Yes
2011-2012 neutral NAO signal / +NAO Winter ... even 
2010-2011: Strong -NAO signal/ Strong -NAO Winter ... Strong Yes

2009-2010: Strong -NAO signal / Strong - NAO Winter ... Yes

2008-2009: weak -NAO signal / weak -NAO Winter ... Yes

2007-2008: -NAO signal / +NAO Winter ... No

2006-2007: +NAO signal / weak +NAO Winter ... Yes

2005-2006: strong +NAO signal / +NAO Winter ... Yes

9-1-2

This index as a value forecasting tool is proven high, although the scientific fundamentals are a bit weaker in my opinion. 

Since so many people have asked me about this in the last few years, I thought it a good idea to make a post. The

 index is a measurement of May 1 - Sept 30 SSTs in the North Atlantic. It's correlated to following November-March NAO/AO (+6 month lag). 

The index is a composite of 2 areas in the North Atlantic (blue box - red box). When blue box is cold SSTs, negative

 NAO Winter. When red box is warm SSTs, negative NAO Winter. For compare, and red box is 65% value of blue box

 anomaly (so -1 blue +0.65 red is same thing). Visa versa. 
The index this year is strong -NAO. Top 10-15 negative index of all predictive years going back to 1948 (69)". 

 

[Typhoon Tip]

Mmm  ...yeah, wasn't gonna chime in on that but ... that seems to me to be a simple matter of 'momentum storage' ...  Other intermediary obtruding forces can mask or mute (transiently) those forces that have a longer integrate curve/weight. It's like ENSO ( prior to 2000 I should add  ) was like a revolving door, and summer temporarily holds the door against the motor, but soon as the kid stops f'n around and playing with the door, it resumes it rotation - 

This is a useful intellectual exercise - it sort of adds support to what I was just talking about - pretty much exactly, too - 

What does summer do to the hemisphere?    It neutralizes gradients ( in general...) the ambient gradients are lessened...the flow unwinds and becomes more nebular because the velocities are less (   A is not longer motile toward B  ) ... and that hides the ENSO by cutting it's integral forcing - 

It's almost a circumstantial proof right there ... if we extend the HC beyond the kiss-point of the ENSO with the westerlies,... that's sort of cutting it's integral forcing ability.  Same thing in principle. 

[40/70 Benchmark]

1 hour ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Maybe it is because the ENSO SST distribution is no longer AS usurping as it used to be in the total integrated machinery of the planetary circulation result.  As an extension ... and possible connection to GW, coincidences suck in physics... usually, there's causality connection; and it appears more so than merely coincidence that recent ENSO events, having not been registering as impactful along/at normal climate pathways as they were prior to the recent empirically proven GW acceleration ..., is just such an annoying coincidence ...which by the way, the advent of those failures has been concurrent with recency -

My hypothesis is that the expansion of the tropical/subtropics found here : https://science2017.globalchange.gov/chapter/5/    ... is at least partial in that causality connection.

The longer version:    The idea of that expansion  of the HC isn't my personal work - so ...maybe start considering that ( not you personally but in general - ).  But, changing the previous ocean-atmospheric modal exchange is as good as any initial educated/existentially rooted guess. It's just to gin up a scientific discussion if not actually process therein, to formulating theory as any I've heard... Which, unfortunately ...isn't a lot - and I admit to that frustrating me.  These are non-arbitrary substantive observations being made by a much larger bevy of sources other than that just being made by me ...

A ... flows toward B.  There's a gap between just being statistically/numerically reliant, and understanding that gradient is everything in Universe.  If there is no movement of A --> B ...entropy is infinite and there is nothing?  This isn't mere philosophy.  All actions and our ability to sense " reality" itself, are because of cause and effects an essentially infinite solution of forces attempting to get to a rest state...  That includes both why the wind blows, and... one's ability to sense the wind blowing.  This adolescent truism seems to escape us when it comes to the teleconnectors and the statistics;  when we assume +1 NAO means this in the atmosphere for us, that sort of unwittingly acts as though that +1 is a force in itself. It's not. It's a result over time then averaged. But the nature of A is no longer stable. And that changes  how A moves toward B ... That change = seasonal forecast pieces of shit for not seeing it.   

SO... tfwiw - ... If the HC band expands above the previous interface of the ENSO ocean-atmospheric coupled region, that is a whopper change in how A relates to B ( which in the context, 'B' refers to the domain outside the ENSO o/a realm)  ..

It's like ( haha ) a stable marriage.  It's runnin' along fine, but then B becomes an alcoholic ... an abusive one at that... Meanwhile A is still doing what A always did ( in this metaphor, oscillating between warm(cool) phases of ENSO), but the changes in B ... means the nature of the marriage has changed - what we do when we ignore expanding HCs and GW and all this shit ...is we assume that B can be an abusive asshole alcoholic and it won't change the nature of their relationship.   WRONG

I admit to having noticed gradient saturation and higher velocities/R-wave stretching and progressive patterning bias over the last 15 to 20 years as becoming more discerned over the course ... but, this science publication above shows that said reality outside of said frame, is ALSO onto this - and you should be too   This regressive reliance is not showing evolution or learning ... I realize that's hard to do in a pathology that is hardened across generations of other consistencies...but therein is the problem.  We've lost the consistency -  

I don't intend this to be an admonishment ...

people really need to start questioning the % forcing capacitance of the ENSO's longer duration oceanic-atmospheric coupled teleconnector when gradient changes how it integrates.

 

Its also possible that the past two winters under performed expectations for other reasons, as other modoki seasons have in the past.

 

[weathafella]

34 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Its also possible that the past two winters under performed expectations for other reasons, as other modoki seasons have in the past.

 

It’s mostly because the database is not large enough to meaningfully expect a certain behavior.   In other words, it may not be greater vs chance.

[Typhoon Tip]

2 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Its also possible that the past two winters under performed expectations for other reasons, as other modoki seasons have in the past.

 

Sure - if one assumes the modoki this and the NINO 1+2 that are still AS effectual in forcing ... maybe - sure... 

I'm not here to make declaratives and aver these hypotheses need preclude the scientific process or nothin'   lol - 

I'm just saying, Modoki shmokey ...  personally? I hunch ENSO over all, thus certainly idiosyncrasies contained within, are being rendered less forcible to the entirety of the planetary integral. 

Oh,... I bet this is the insight of the young Met century that chaos will now go out of its way to happenstance/circumstantially make it only look less true by metaphysically constructing a dildo... I mean a winter that actually fits the predisposition. Everyone goes    seeee ...   lowers their guard, and the oceans stop C02 fixing and the extinction event is complete - muah ahahaha

oh, sorry - wrong subject

[Typhoon Tip]

Anyway, jokes and speculation aside... 

Though I have my convictions emerging about that other shit ...I think in the meantime we have a N-stream dominate winter by appearance.  

Here's the trouble though - I don't know if STJ's are also problematic in an expanded HC thing ?     Because ... seems with the gradient being pushed/relocated N of 1700 - 1980 ... more so since 2000 ... that starts exceeding those latitude where we see that particular feature - the impetus behind this reasoning is that for one ...I am some kind of catastrophic loser with no life ... 

why am I f'n typing this crap ... 

but two, gradient in the troposphere derives the axis of westerlies/Jet streams by classical convention -

 

[40/70 Benchmark]

7 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

Sure - if one assumes the modoki this and the NINO 1+2 that are still AS effectual in forcing ... maybe - sure... 

I'm not here to make declaratives and aver these hypothesis are preclude the scientific process or nothin'   lol - 

I'm just saying, Modoki shmokey ...  personally? I hunch ENSO over all, thus certainly idiosyncrasies contained within, are being rendered less forcible to the entirety of the planetary integral. 

Oh,... I bet this is the insight of the young Met century that chaos will now go out of its way to happenstance/circumstantially make it only look less true by metaphysically constructing a dildo... I mean a winter that actually fits the predisposition. Everyone goes    seeee ...   lowers their guard, and the ocean stop C02 fixing and extinction even is complete - 

oh, sorry - wrong subject

That is wrong IMO....assuming the warm ENSO event is coupled, the placement of the anomalies does dictate forcing and Hadley cell arrangement. I understand that perhaps the past couple were negated by the expanding Hadley cell....I am speaking of the ENSO events that do couple.

The MEI does imply that the past two were poorly coupled, but so were 2004 and 2014.

[Typhoon Tip]

34 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

That is wrong IMO....assuming the warm ENSO event is coupled, the placement of the anomalies does dictate forcing and Hadley cell arrangement. I understand that perhaps the past couple were negated by the expanding Hadley cell....I am speaking of the ENSO events that do couple.

The MEI does imply that the past two were poorly coupled, but so were 2004 and 2014.

If it is coupled ... sure... But expanding HC doesn't mean it can't couple ...just that thermodynamically in an oceanic-atmospheric couple environment, if the warm HC does manage to couple with a warm ocean, the gradient where the HC terminates with the westerlies is still N of where the coupled region was ... prior to 2000 and so forth... But a warm expanded HC makes it harder for coupling because the thermodynamics is differentiated less -

If/when the latitude of the HC terminations/gradient N, that alters the R-wave structures around the hemisphere ...either way -   

But during the great super Nino that happen 4 or 5 clicks ago now...  ( was that 2014 ?) NCEP's ENSO publications routinely stated ...all year long, that the atmosphere was not appearing to be actually coupled to the ENSO state - pretty much that is 95% quotable string as they even stated it... Finally...toward the third week of February, that seemed to change - and they even said, 'finally... ' 

But the HC structure is not being dictate by ENSO...that's not true - nope.  The HC is expanding ... because warm total atmosphere stores more water vapor in gaseous form, and the tropics are storing more thermally - the ENSOs are engulfed inside that bubble. 

It's really like said bubble used to expand( contract) by warm(cool) ENSO's ... but since the HC expanded beyond the ENSO belt ... it's not clear the HC is responding - as NCEPs noted and these evidence of breakdown climatology have also been materializing...  Outside of my hypothesis these are true ..but they fit -

 

[ORH_wxman]

2 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Its also possible that the past two winters under performed expectations for other reasons, as other modoki seasons have in the past.

 

Most of it IMHO is attributable to the AO....the AO region has been much more positive the past half-decade vs the 15 years before that (and especially the 2007-2013 timeframe).

 

Now what is driving the AO?

Whoever figures that one out wins the big prize....LOL.

[40/70 Benchmark]

34 minutes ago, Typhoon Tip said:

If it is coupled ... sure... But expanding HC doesn't mean it can't couple ...just that thermodynamically in an oceanic-atmospheric couple environment, if the warm HC does manage to couple with a warm ocean, the gradient where the HC terminates with the westerlies is still N of where the coupled region was ... prior to 2000 and so forth... But a warm expanded HC makes it harder for coupling because the thermodynamics is differentiated less -

If/when the latitude of the HC terminations/gradient N, that alters the R-wave structures around the hemisphere ...either way -   

But during the great super Nino that happen 4 or 5 clicks ago now...  ( was that 2014 ?) NCEP's ENSO publications routinely stated ...all year long, that the atmosphere was not appearing to be actually coupled to the ENSO state - pretty much that is 95% quotable string as they even stated it... Finally...toward the third week of February, that seemed to change - and they even said, 'finally... ' 

But the HC structure is not being dictate by ENSO...that's not true - nope.  The HC is expanding ... because warm total atmosphere stores more water vapor in gaseous form, and the tropics are storing more thermally - the ENSOs are engulfed inside that bubble. 

It's really like said bubble used to expand( contract) by warm(cool) ENSO's ... but since the HC expanded beyond the ENSO belt ... it's not clear the HC is responding - as NCEPs noted and these evidence of breakdown climatology have also been materializing...  Outside of my hypothesis these are true ..but they fit -

 

Ahhh....a well coupled ENSO event is absolutely one of the factors that modulates the Hadley cell-Yup.

That last uber warm ENSO event in 2015  was very well coupled, which is why that winter behaved as most intense el nino events do and it was very mild. That is not a coincidence....it absolutely has an impact on the placement of Hadley and Ferrel cells.

The MEI values further evince that the 2015 event was very well coupled:

2015	0.2	0.1	0.1	0.4	1	1.9	1.7	1.9	2.2	2.1	1.9	1.9
2016	1.9	1.8	1.3

I do agree that it was LESS coupled than the 1997 event, which was of comparable ONI strength....if you want to argue that that is due to the Hadley cell expansion, then I am all ears....but I think that you get carried away with this.

This season's cool ENSO event is also coupled....with the AS reading just released now down to -1.2.

 

[40/70 Benchmark]

10 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

Most of it IMHO is attributable to the AO....the AO region has been much more positive the past half-decade vs the 15 years before that (and especially the 2007-2013 timeframe).

 

Now what is driving the AO?

Whoever figures that one out wins the big prize....LOL.

Agreed.....Ordinarily, modoki el nino events favor a neg NAO and AO, but obviously there were more pervasive global factors at play....whether it be the IOD, etc....

[Typhoon Tip]

15 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

Ahhh....a well coupled ENSO event is absolutely one of the factors that modulates the Hadley cell-Yup.

That last uber warm ENSO event in 2015  was very well coupled, which is why that winter behaved as most intense el nino events do and it was very mild. That is not a coincidence....it absolutely has an impact of the Hadley and Ferrel cells.

The MEI values further evince that the 2015 event was very well coupled:

2015	0.2	0.1	0.1	0.4	1	1.9	1.7	1.9	2.2	2.1	1.9	1.9
2016	1.9	1.8	1.3

 

This season's cool ENSO event is also coupled....with the AS reading just released now down to -1.2

NCEP reported that winter that season, it was not well coupled until very late in the winter months  ...don't blame messenger   ... I remember the pattern over N America not resembling the El Nino very well - and when I read that...I was like, well yeah.  

- not to mention...it was a supposedly an off the chart hot EL NINO and it had trouble coupling in their estimation.  I don't believe those MEI number reveal the ENSO was driving the global patternization though - you can tuck those MEI numbers into a maelstrom dominated by super circumstances that mute its existence. The MEI is still just a band within narrow latitudes, well inside the HC's termination latitudes with the westerlies - which is where the pattern is defined over top all that.   MEI may have been coupled ... but the atmosphere around it was not demonstrating its exertion - that's the point.   

And, the climate zones were being less impacted, concertedly, too -  again...that's not me. 

Also, I wouldn't claim coupling was not a factor...  It's a matter of how much so - ... as usual.  There are no 1::1 correlations... maybe what was once a .64::1 correlation is now .38::1 thing ... 

[40/70 Benchmark]

Just now, Typhoon Tip said:

NCEP reported that winter that season, it was not well coupled until very late in the winter months  ...don't blame messenger   ... I remember the pattern over N America not resembling the El Nino very well - and when I read that...I was like, well yeah.  

- not to mention...it was a supposedly an off the chart hot EL NINO and it had trouble coupling in their estimation.  I don't believe those MEI number reveal the ENSO was driving the global patternization though - you can tuck those MEI numers into a maelstrom dominated by super circumstances the mute it's existence. The MEI is still just a band within narrow latitudes, well inside the HC's termination latitudes with the westerlies - which is where the pattern is defined over top all that.   MEI may have been coupled ... but the atmosphere around it was not demonstrating its exertion - that's the point.   

And, the climate zones were being less impacted, concertedly, too -  again...that's not me. 

Also, I would claim coupling was not a factor...  It's a matter of how much so - ... as usual.  There are no 1::1 correlations... maybe what was once a .64::1 correlation is now .38::1 thing ... 

Well, NOAA updates the MEI.

As for the underlined....I agree that it was not as well coupled as 1997. I added to my response too late. I don't agree that the atmosphere around it was not responding...less than you would expect based upon the intensity, sure.