Roger Smith winter forecast 2022-23

[Roger Smith]

This forecast (as always with me) is based on a study of index values for presumed similar external drivers. Also what's somewhat different about my approach is that you just get a long-range forecast, no graphics about this, that or the other. 

My basic forecast is a rather average outcome, perhaps a bit on the snowy side of normal for many eastern and central locations, with severe cold intrusions possible at all times due to conditions already developing in the west-central subarctic. 

So in general, would expect much of the time to average within 5-8 deg of normal with brief much colder intervals possible, in eastern and central regions. Western regions will feel the impact of the cold spells as is already evident, more frequently and for longer intervals. 

There is potential for some very severe or extreme storm events this winter. Energy levels are ranked in the highest 10%, especially around dates of new and full moons. These severe storms could provide blizzards in some cases, most likely to affect the Midwest and Great Lakes regions, but not ruling out the northeast or even mid-Atlantic states.

West coast rainfalls will likely be above normal in parts of central and northern CA, Oregon, WA and sw BC but a colder than average regime may cut off some rainfalls turning them to snow as part of expected above normal snowfalls inland WA and much of BC. This snow anomaly will probably extend southeast into the central Rockies with the storm track often running OR-sUT-nNM before recurving. 

Some analogue years have had very mild spells in winter (east, central) and brief cold spells, but those managed to deliver on heavy snowfall events from few opportunities. I think this winter will tend to run closer to a balance of mild and cold and more frequent opportunities for snow. 

If any of the three winter months is to be much colder than average, I would pick December as most likely. 

Good luck to all who dare to issue these outlooks. I've been reading others and felt there was perhaps enough of a difference with mine to add it to the mix, although I see certain overlaps with some of them too. 

[raindancewx]

I've been meaning to ask you for a while - when you say energy levels - what exactly are you measuring? Also, how?

I'm always interested in adding new datasets to test for statistical relationships, but your stuff to my knowledge is not defined on the board.

[Roger Smith]

At the risk of over-simplifying some rather complicated constructs in my own research, the energy level concept can be taken to mean potential energy for storm intensity following a theory that atmospheric variations are partly governed by external astronomical factors, notably lunar, operating within an interference pattern type of grid in the atmosphere. This interference pattern has been postulated to consist of nine focal "timing lines" which can oscillate but at equilibrium are located around the hemisphere at equal separations, starting from the first (arbitrarily defined) timing line which corresponds to the geomagnetic feature known as the invariant arc (where compass north is due north) but smoothed out and running approximately Beaufort Sea s.s.e. through central northern Canada to western Great Lakes, South Carolina and on towards west Africa (all of this grid is postulated to be reflected in the southern hemisphere; the magnetic poles are taken as "meteorological north poles" although a separate set of assumptions is required to handle polar climate outcomes in better detail. So the other timing lines run parallel to that one, you would be located fairly close to timing line 9 which drops out of the western arctic through BC, Idaho, w Colorado into e NM and then towards the GOM. The timing lines are numbered (arbitrarily again) in an eastward direction. ... So the energy level hypothesis in its raw form states that storm development near these nine timing lines will depend on an interaction between lunar tidal forces (moving through the interference pattern) and conventional meteorological considerations which involve placing ridges and troughs in this grid, also based on certain assumptions about solar system magnetic field interactions with our atmosphere. The net result is that one can forecast at least in terms of statistical averages how the circulation will respond and within that, using principles that every other type of model also uses, generating storm track intensity predictions. 

Split flow outcomes in this model will create separate low pressure areas on timing lines but they will not be aligned north-south, but along the curving grid lines of the model, so that for example on some occasions a low moving through west Texas could be in phase in this model with another low in the eastern GOM or in central BC or the Yukon. 

You could find a much more detailed summary over at the Net-weather forum in their science sub-forum, under my name (same as here except that to create an account I had to use my middle initial so I am Roger J Smith on net-weather). As I say, this is a theory under development, and not widely known, certainly not accepted (for whatever that's worth in this world, acceptance of certain ideas and rejection of others now appearing to be some sort of cosmic circus and of little interest to an old guy with better things to do than butt heads with scientific authorities). 

[raindancewx]

I mostly asked because your profile lists you as a man in his 70s. Probably not the worst idea in the world to detail the way things in your research work with instructions for how to use it, and what you'd like to see tested further in the future. I keep pretty detailed notes of weather things I expect to happen in the 2030s/2040s/2050s/2060s if I'm still alive. That way even if I die early someone can go through it all and see if I was just another crazy crank in the end.

[Roger Smith]

I think one has to insist that one is always right to qualify as a crank, if one just says they are working on developing a theory and have seen good results from it, but do not claim that it's a finished work that operates like a fully accepted scientific theory, then one avoids that designation. Anyway, if I don't, it won't make any difference, either this is a good path or not a good path. I think it's a good path. And yes, being 73 does open up questions of preserving the work, I have a lot of contacts on various weather forums and in my personal life, this work won't just disappear entirely when I do. If I do, I am quite healthy and the way medical advances are going, ya never know. 

My first summary may have made this point, but I thought I would underscore this, when I talk about the role of lunar tidal forces, they are only being claimed as partly responsible for weather systems, not patterns, those are more likely to be linked to variations in the solar system magnetic field. One could believe the latter but not my contention that planetary positions in orbit modulate this, so a test of the hypothesis could be two part, does the pattern reflect the state of the SSMF, and does that reflect planetary positions? It could in theory be yes for (a) and no for (b). There may be others researching that concept, when you hear the term "space weather" it is not this specific, it is used more as a title for a field of study and reporting but it does refer to energy flux from the Sun and how that impacts on our atmosphere. I have read other scientific papers, some published (mostly in eastern Europe) and some just circulated for review, investigating many of the same concepts as my theory attempts to develop. The lunar portion had some other adherents back in the mid-20th century, I don't think it survived to the present time. The problem for other researchers has always been that they never caught on to the timing line concept and expected the energy levels to appear everywhere at once. This of course is not going to happen, the atmosphere is not going to ebb and flow as a whole entity, such energy flows will always be localized. 

Why an interference pattern? Well the main reason is that unlike the oceans, the atmosphere has no absolute boundaries (in the horizontal axis), there are partial boundaries presented by mountain ranges and the ITCZ, but energy flowing around in the atmosphere will not be constrained by coasts like ocean tides. If the world had an unbroken ocean, tidal effects would start to operate in the same way, an interference pattern, since the waves of energy keep moving outward. Having coastlines means that oceans have to produce periodic tides. and the more constraining the coast, the bigger the tides.