January Medium/Long Range Discussion

[StormchaserChuck!]

Here we go.. 4th reload of the +480contour(pink) -PNA, new model trend/record. You can tell that this wants to blast the Pac Jet thereafter, maybe it will trend different future runs. 

[psuhoffman]

@CAPE unfortunately the eps is predictably pulling the rug again. I say predictably because it’s not changing anything except the strength of the SE ridge. And we’ve seen that’s being supported by the pac pattern. 
 

This is the old day 13.5

Note I’ve identified the placement of all key longwave features. The SE ridge is there but suppressed. However look at the pac.  Why is it suppressing the SE ridge?  We’ve still not seen any positive changes to the upstream factors. 
 

here is the new day 13. 

Nothing changes in the placement of all the key features. But as it’s getting closer and less smoother out, and the features come into better clarity, predictably the SE ridge is pumping more. That will continue to happen until something changes with the equation of the 3 features I circled in the pac. One of them has to move to shake that up. Or the equation between the Aleutian ridge and NAO needs to flip. If the Aleutian ridge weakens and the NAO ridge is the more dominant that can also work. But so long as those 3 features remain AND the Aleutian ridge is stronger than the NAO ridge we’re going to continue to see the SE ridge trend stronger and kill our changes imo. 

[Ji]

14 minutes ago, psuhoffman said:

@CAPE unfortunately the eps is predictably pulling the rug again. I say predictably because it’s not changing anything except the strength of the SE ridge. And we’ve seen that’s being supported by the pac pattern. 
 

This is the old day 13.5

Note I’ve identified the placement of all key longwave features. The SE ridge is there but suppressed. However look at the pac.  Why is it suppressing the SE ridge?  We’ve still not seen any positive changes to the upstream factors. 
 

here is the new day 13. 

Nothing changes in the placement of all the key features. But as it’s getting closer and less smoother out, and the features come into better clarity, predictably the SE ridge is pumping more. That will continue to happen until something changes with the equation of the 3 features I circled in the pac. One of them has to move to shake that up. Or the equation between the Aleutian ridge and NAO needs to flip. If the Aleutian ridge weakens and the NAO ridge is the more dominant that can also work. But so long as those 3 features remain AND the Aleutian ridge is stronger than the NAO ridge we’re going to continue to see the SE ridge trend stronger and kill our changes imo. 

never bet against a la nina pattern in a la nina lol. big ass SE ridge...gulf of mexico shut down...dry..warm and boring. Of course we cant even get Nino anymore...i thought global warming(climate change--assuming its not a hoax) would give us more Nino

[TSG]

10 minutes ago, Ji said:

never bet against a la nina pattern in a la nina lol. big ass SE ridge...gulf of mexico shut down...dry..warm and boring. Of course we cant even get Nino anymore...i thought global warming(climate change--assuming its not a hoax) would give us more Nino

The high latitudes are warming much faster than the equator so I think it's more likely to disrupt what we know as the base state than to give us more regular Nino conditions.

[Maestrobjwa]

6 minutes ago, Ji said:

never bet against a la nina pattern in a la nina lol. big ass SE ridge...gulf of mexico shut down...dry..warm and boring. Of course we cant even get Nino anymore...i thought global warming(climate change--assuming its not a hoax) would give us more Nino

Ya know I had asked a question awhile ago about why warming wouldn't equate to warmer waters in the ENSO...but then someone rather sharply brought to my attention that enso state--water temperatures--are basically wind-driven. 

Now my question then is...if trade winds and such drive enso, I wanna know why they've been more nina the the last 6 years than nino.

[psuhoffman]

15 minutes ago, Ji said:

never bet against a la nina pattern in a la nina lol. big ass SE ridge...gulf of mexico shut down...dry..warm and boring. Of course we cant even get Nino anymore...i thought global warming(climate change--assuming its not a hoax) would give us more Nino

Except what you’re describing isn’t a La Niña. This is the comp of all Nina’s in the last 30 years. 

And that’s skewed by a couple of the ninas like 2008 and 2012 that were that way. But those are try outliers. Most Nina’s (if they have blocking) have a suppressed SE ridge and it’s just cold/dry. This isn’t a typical Nina.  What you’re describing sounds more like 2002, 2017 and 2020 which were all enso neutral winters. 

[Maestrobjwa]

5 minutes ago, TSG said:

The high latitudes are warming much faster than the equator so I think it's more likely to disrupt what we know as the base state than to give us more regular Nino conditions.

How do the high latitudes affect whether the ENSO is nina or Nino? Or is it more about how high latitude warming affects the atmospheric response?

I remember folks saying the 2018-19 weak Niño never "coupled" to the atmosphere. Is that an example of what you're referring to?

[psuhoffman]

8 minutes ago, Maestrobjwa said:

Ya know I had asked a question awhile ago about why warming wouldn't equate to warmer waters in the ENSO...but then someone rather sharply brought to my attention that enso state--water temperatures--are basically wind-driven. 

Now my question then is...if trade winds and such drive enso, I wanna know why they've been more nina the the last 6 years than nino.

Cyclical. We had 4 Nina’s in 6 years from 1996-2001. Then only 1 in the next 7 years. 4 in 5 years from 2007-2012 then none from 2013-2017. 

[StormchaserChuck!]

There is a chance models are just wrong about Jan 1-5 -PNA [or maybe it's lagged], this is what the last 20 times Pac NW was cold Jan 1-5 (strong signal now) looked like ,ENSO state-verifies opposite, believe it or not

January full month of 20 analogs (Jan 1-5 Pac NW cold dataset)

20 years

 

^I was curious if that is any lead for us. 

[RIC_WX]

17 minutes ago, Ji said:

never bet against a la nina pattern in a la nina lol.

There are years where one factor cannot singlehandedly overwhelm the equation.  This is not one of them.

Eventually this pattern breaks down, hopefully with meaningful time left on the clock.  Climate change or not, historically bad patterns exist in the data set (94-95, 01-02) and sometimes spawn spectacular reversals 12 months later. 

Until something changes, break out the shorts.

[BristowWx]

3 minutes ago, RIC_WX said:

There are years where one factor cannot singlehandedly overwhelm the equation.  This is not one of them.

Eventually this pattern breaks down, hopefully with meaningful time left on the clock.  Climate change or not, historically bad patterns exist in the data set (94-95, 01-02) and sometimes spawn spectacular reversals 12 months later. 

Until something changes, break out the shorts.

Could be worse.  Imagine this pattern with a +NAO.  

[WinterWxLuvr]

2 hours ago, IronTy said:

45 days, 45 hours...220, 221...whatever it takes...basically the same thing.

No it isn’t. I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make, but the one I’m making is that trying to use 50 different snowfall maps to try and make a forecast is stupid. But it draws people like a moth to a flame. 

[RIC_WX]

5 minutes ago, BristowWx said:

Could be worse.  Imagine this pattern with a +NAO.  

Zonal flow would set up, not an illogical way out of the present mess.  But I don't think we would like the outcome much better.

[WinterWxLuvr]

Less than about 36 hours ago people here were giddy with how the long range looked and now there is nothing but despair. Why out stock in long range forecasts? The logic of that baffles me. Not bashing discussion of it. Just discussing it as if it is a lock.

[Scraff]

7 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

Less than about 36 hours ago people here were giddy with how the long range looked and now there is nothing but despair. Why out stock in long range forecasts? The logic of that baffles me. Not bashing discussion of it. Just discussing it as if it is a lock.

Tomorrow will bring something different and entirely new. I’ll just close my blinds until the morning. 

[mattie g]

2 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

I’d feel better if that vortex north of Japan would move at all. It’s parked there on everything for the next 2 weeks and that feeds into the Aleutian ridge. 

But what locks that vortex in? And what locks in the thing that locks that in? This is where I get confused. Something has to set the baseline for the overall hemispherical (global?) wavelength pattern, right? What's the chicken and what's the egg?

[clskinsfan]

On the bright side for next winter. Without an Aleutian low this winter we are much more likely to get a nino next year. I am not tossing this winter yet. But the Pac is ugly. And I am not seeing how that is going to break down anytime soon. 

https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/33/8/jcli-d-19-0717.1.xml

[StormchaserChuck!]

11 minutes ago, clskinsfan said:

On the bright side for next winter. Without an Aleutian low this winter we are much more likely to get a nino next year. I am not tossing this winter yet. But the Pac is ugly. And I am not seeing how that is going to break down anytime soon. 

https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/33/8/jcli-d-19-0717.1.xml

Actually, with the 6SD -PNA this December vs warm subsurface ENSO, we are likely to see, the opposite of if it's leading a Strong El Nino event, and next Jan-Feb are likely to be -PNA. (2010-2012, 1955-1957). I always thought a Nov-Dec Kelvin wave would lead big +ENSO event the next year, but we seem to do opposite, it's a "sign" maybe for 1-3 years ahead, but the ENSO climo seems to reverse. 

[EastCoast NPZ]

Just checking in today and see the models have brought tidings of great joy.  Just great.  Perfect.

[IronTy]

2 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

I’ll admit not having the expertise to necessarily parse this accurately. Maybe someone else can add value. But one of the things driving the colder expected pattern was that mjo phase 7 is cold in a Nina. However, the soi has been tanking and today is at -27, more Nino than Nina. Just pointing this out because phase 7 in a Nino is warm and looks a lot like what we’re seeing.  However, I know the mjo also affects the soi so…

JB was all over this in a recent post but fortunately he didn't explain it either.  He's usually pretty good about explaining things in his premium members videos (nothing like his lame tweets).  Again, I give him a lot of shit but he's usually pretty good in his actual videos vs. lame tweets. 

[Eskimo Joe]

Yikes. Credit to Chuck, he called this.

 

[IronTy]

53 minutes ago, WinterWxLuvr said:

No it isn’t. I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make, but the one I’m making is that trying to use 50 different snowfall maps to try and make a forecast is stupid. But it draws people like a moth to a flame. 

220, 221..whatever it takes..come on man that shoulda been a strong clue I was being sarcastic.  Kids these days.  

[BristowWx]

17 minutes ago, EastCoast NPZ said:

Just checking in today and see the models have brought tidings of great joy.  Just great.  Perfect.

Icon came in clutch with less torchy Xmas…have to be happy with warm terd stew vs cold terd stew.  Quite the temp gradient RIC is baking

[SnowGoose69]

1 hour ago, psuhoffman said:

@CAPE unfortunately the eps is predictably pulling the rug again. I say predictably because it’s not changing anything except the strength of the SE ridge. And we’ve seen that’s being supported by the pac pattern. 
 

This is the old day 13.5

Note I’ve identified the placement of all key longwave features. The SE ridge is there but suppressed. However look at the pac.  Why is it suppressing the SE ridge?  We’ve still not seen any positive changes to the upstream factors. 
 

here is the new day 13. 

Nothing changes in the placement of all the key features. But as it’s getting closer and less smoother out, and the features come into better clarity, predictably the SE ridge is pumping more. That will continue to happen until something changes with the equation of the 3 features I circled in the pac. One of them has to move to shake that up. Or the equation between the Aleutian ridge and NAO needs to flip. If the Aleutian ridge weakens and the NAO ridge is the more dominant that can also work. But so long as those 3 features remain AND the Aleutian ridge is stronger than the NAO ridge we’re going to continue to see the SE ridge trend stronger and kill our changes imo. 

Ultimately if this same pattern was around in 8 weeks I think the MA and north MA have better success.  The NAO effectiveness, maybe due to shortening wavelengths has always been shown to be way more at beating down a SER in a lousy pattern the later you get in winter, December is the month with the worst AO/NAO correlation for sure.  We could have used this setup 6 weeks from now

[Amped]

18Z GFS has  silly looking 985MB low over Buffalo day 4.   Gives NE plenty of snow and us plenty of wind.

[frd]

55 minutes ago, Eskimo Joe said:

Yikes. Credit to Chuck, he called this.

 

 

Both the EPS and the GEFS support a  - 5 PNA.  Also, the PNA remains negative for the next 360 hours.   

 

 

[CAPE]

2 hours ago, psuhoffman said:

@CAPE unfortunately the eps is predictably pulling the rug again. I say predictably because it’s not changing anything except the strength of the SE ridge. And we’ve seen that’s being supported by the pac pattern. 
 

This is the old day 13.5

Note I’ve identified the placement of all key longwave features. The SE ridge is there but suppressed. However look at the pac.  Why is it suppressing the SE ridge?  We’ve still not seen any positive changes to the upstream factors. 
 

here is the new day 13. 

Nothing changes in the placement of all the key features. But as it’s getting closer and less smoother out, and the features come into better clarity, predictably the SE ridge is pumping more. That will continue to happen until something changes with the equation of the 3 features I circled in the pac. One of them has to move to shake that up. Or the equation between the Aleutian ridge and NAO needs to flip. If the Aleutian ridge weakens and the NAO ridge is the more dominant that can also work. But so long as those 3 features remain AND the Aleutian ridge is stronger than the NAO ridge we’re going to continue to see the SE ridge trend stronger and kill our changes imo. 

I was looking at it as it was rolling out but had to go before the run completed. The primary thing that stuck out to me was not as good a look in the HL region, specifically the -NAO,  which looks weaker and the indication of a TPV lobe underneath is absent in todays' run. Fairly subtle changes on a LR mean, but perhaps enough to allow the SE ridge to bulge northward more than previous runs. Overall not a big difference in successive runs for a day 10+ mean, so we have to watch the 'trends'. That said, I believe the expectation with the stalled MJO is that we don't see the progression we would like as soon, and the SE ridge will be tough to flatten.

[CAPE]

1 hour ago, Eskimo Joe said:

Yikes. Credit to Chuck, he called this.

 

He hammered it. Beat the living eff out the dead horse. He was right. That said, a persistent -PNA is highly correlated to a Nina. One simple post would have done the trick. Didn't really need 100+.

[SnowenOutThere]

Don’t worry everyone the 18 GFS is cold for Early Jan, cancel winter cancel because we all know the main run of the GFS is never wrong at range.

[nj2va]

I’ll take a +PNA over a -NAO.