2024-2025 La Nina

[40/70 Benchmark]

4 hours ago, Terpeast said:

Let’s see what the west pacific does as far as typhoon season goes. Maybe it will help dent that marine heat wave off Japan. 

And your exact verbiage was a "better" winter in the east...do me a favor....go though the high ACE years and show me a worse winter than this one...

I'm not saying forecast forecast 1995-1996 due to high ACE La Nina....rather a fighting chance to avoid another anemic year.

[Terpeast]

26 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

And your exact verbiage was a "better" winter in the east...do me a favor....go though the high ACE years and show me a worse winter than this one...

I'm not saying forecast forecast 1995-1996 due to high ACE La Nina....rather a fighting chance to avoid another anemic year.

You could be right, but its hard to bet against the current pacific state and warm mjo phase dominance since 2018. Maybe high ACE will change that, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Otherwise, persistence is the winning play (and that’s coming from someone who went against persistence for the 23-24 winter outlook)

[Stormchaserchuck1]

Better start breeding those butterflies in Africa. 

[40/70 Benchmark]

31 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

You could be right, but its hard to bet against the current pacific state and warm mjo phase dominance since 2018. Maybe high ACE will change that, but I’ll believe it when I see it. Otherwise, persistence is the winning play (and that’s coming from someone who went against persistence for the 23-24 winter outlook)

Yes, I agree. ACE will need to be over 200 for me to even consider it.

[Stormchaserchuck1]

For the next 2 weeks, there is an impressive High pressure setting up in the N. Pacific Ocean. The strength is going to rival some of the strongest on record. This pattern started, imo, when the cold water moved into the central-ENSO-subsurface. The SOI being super negative was holding the pattern back for a while, but when that moderated, the major pattern moved into the N. Pacific Ocean. It seems to be super-connected to the La Nina early, so I don't see why that wouldn't last through the event, and maybe even with such a strong correlation that it holds the strength of the coming La Nina down some.

With the 500mb conditions in the N. Pacific that have occurred Feb-March 2018-2024, breaking high anomaly records in other times by +20-25%, it's easy to formulate that we are at the peak of this "global La Nina cycle", or some are calling it the -PDO, or +AMO.  The -PNA pattern held in the Summer/Fall through a lot of the Strong El Nino last year, breaking the strong-ENSO correlation we had, had for many decades, so it will be interesting to see what happens going back to the opposite ENSO state this year. La Nina's have been hitting on N. Pacific pattern correlation, El Nino's have not been. 

[michsnowfreak]

23 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

And your exact verbiage was a "better" winter in the east...do me a favor....go though the high ACE years and show me a worse winter than this one...

I'm not saying forecast forecast 1995-1996 due to high ACE La Nina....rather a fighting chance to avoid another anemic year.

I had never really heard of ACE until recently. Is it something that we can put on par with things like NAO, PDO, etc? And how high does this year's ACE rank? I may have missed it earlier in the thread.

 

What's ironic looking at the top 10 highest ACE years and following winters, the worst one here was 1995-96, and that was a product of being in a cold, dry screwzone. It was a cold winter, just a nightmare of missed snow chances. Most of the others were good winters, and nearly all had an abnormally snowy month (a common characteristic of ninas locally as well). But the best takeaway is that none of them were close to the widespread atrocity this winter was. 

[40/70 Benchmark]

On 2/25/2024 at 2:08 PM, michsnowfreak said:

I had never really heard of ACE until recently. Is it something that we can put on par with things like NAO, PDO, etc? And how high does this year's ACE rank? I may have missed it earlier in the thread.

 

What's ironic looking at the top 10 highest ACE years and following winters, the worst one here was 1995-96, and that was a product of being in a cold, dry screwzone. It was a cold winter, just a nightmare of missed snow chances. Most of the others were good winters, and nearly all had an abnormally snowy month (a common characteristic of ninas locally as well). But the best takeaway is that none of them were close to the widespread atrocity this winter was. 

I had never it considered until Raindance drew my attention to it the past couple of La Nina seasons....it seems to play a role in the alignment of the extra tropical atmosphere during the following winter in cold ENSO seasons. 

[raindancewx]

I've actually found a lot more predictive 'events' with La Nina than El Nino over the years.

A few examples:

Early heat waves in the West (ABQ first 90F high, where 1 is May 1, 31 is May 31, etc) in La Nina are highly correlated to cold winters in the Rockies/West for La Nina. This is from my outlook for 2022-23. I've always assumed this worked because it meant a coherent MJO wave in phase 4-5-6-7 was showing up around 5/1. At a standard 45 day MJO lag (more dark arts, i.e. counting), that turns to 6/15, 7/30, 9/15, 10/30, 12/15, 1/30, 3/15 which indicates that 4-5-6-7 will show up several times in winter, when it is a cold signal here. MJO 5 is generally cold here early on (Nov-Jan).

La Nina cold snaps in the West are also highly tied to ACE in the Atlantic -

In the absence of cold snaps in the West, the cold either isn't anywhere in America, or it is going to the East. But really for the East, the high ACE thing is more of a good snow year indicator than a cold indicator.

[chubbs]

This paper indicates that man-made aerosol effects on enso can be prolonged, well after the emissions have been reduced. Could help explain recent favoring of la nina.

The discrepancy between the observed lack of surface warming in the eastern equatorial Pacific and climate model projections of an El Niño-like warming pattern confronts the climate research community. While anthropogenic aerosols have been suggested as a cause, the prolonged cooling trend over the equatorial Pacific appears in conflict with Northern Hemisphere aerosol emission reduction since the 1980s. Here, using CESM, we show that the superposition of fast and slow responses to aerosol emission change—an increase followed by a decrease—can sustain the La Niña-like condition for a longer time than expected.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2315124121

[LibertyBell]

On 2/24/2024 at 10:39 AM, Terpeast said:

Let’s see what the west pacific does as far as typhoon season goes. Maybe it will help dent that marine heat wave off Japan. 

we need a massively active typhoon season out there to do that don't we?

[LibertyBell]

On 2/24/2024 at 10:57 AM, michsnowfreak said:

Nothing is ever a guarantee. But it's always a best bet to play the odds. Have their been dud la ninas here? Yes. But the overall odds favor a much better winter. And for the same Northwoods areas that are setting records for low snow in northern MN and northern MI this winter, the odds are even stronger for bountiful snow next winter. One trend that is quite strong here locally in a la nina, regardless of strength, is having one well above avg snow month. For some reason it's usually December or February.

 

Ill defer analyzing New England to those familiar with the climo but I do feel that a handful of bad winters, which are a combination of both bad patterns AND bad luck, are jading things a bit. It was not that long ago that everyone from the Great Lakes to the New England was destroying climo with abundant snow seemingly no matter what the pattern was. Things do change and patterns don't last forever. 

 

Lastly, one rule I have always followed in weather. And I KNOW this is not popular among some. Is that when you have a great winter, or string of them, the odds increase that a stinker is coming up...and it works vice versa. It's gone on since the beginning of climate record. 

but you'd think the opposite would be true, since more snow and cold breeds more snow and cold and patterns tend to get stuck.

Some outside factor has to come in and dislodge them-- like the 2015-16 super el nino.

 

[Terpeast]

1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:

we need a massively active typhoon season out there to do that don't we?

Yeah, and it has to be on the pacific side. I don’t see how atlantic activity would help.

2 hours ago, chubbs said:

This paper indicates that man-made aerosol effects on enso can be prolonged, well after the emissions have been reduced. Could help explain recent favoring of la nina.

The discrepancy between the observed lack of surface warming in the eastern equatorial Pacific and climate model projections of an El Niño-like warming pattern confronts the climate research community. While anthropogenic aerosols have been suggested as a cause, the prolonged cooling trend over the equatorial Pacific appears in conflict with Northern Hemisphere aerosol emission reduction since the 1980s. Here, using CESM, we show that the superposition of fast and slow responses to aerosol emission change—an increase followed by a decrease—can sustain the La Niña-like condition for a longer time than expected.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.2315124121

Great article. The last line in this paper opens the possibility for a reversal to an el nino background state once the aerosol effect on enso runs its course (if they’re correct about the cause)

[40/70 Benchmark]

27 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Yeah, and it has to be on the pacific side. I don’t see how atlantic activity would help.

Great article. The last line in this paper opens the possibility for a reversal to an el nino background state once the aerosol effect on enso runs its course (if they’re correct about the cause)

It obviously wouldn't help alter the Pacific SSTs....that is more of an infuence with respect to the extra tropical atmosphere to favor more ridgin over the western CONUS and troughing east. You can see it clear as day in Raindance's data.

[LibertyBell]

2 hours ago, Terpeast said:

Yeah, and it has to be on the pacific side. I don’t see how atlantic activity would help.

Great article. The last line in this paper opens the possibility for a reversal to an el nino background state once the aerosol effect on enso runs its course (if they’re correct about the cause)

these are human caused aerosols? where did they come from?

[michsnowfreak]

6 hours ago, LibertyBell said:

but you'd think the opposite would be true, since more snow and cold breeds more snow and cold and patterns tend to get stuck.

Some outside factor has to come in and dislodge them-- like the 2015-16 super el nino.

 

Again that's just my observation locally. And while the 2015-16 nino certainly did herald in the end of the glory days era and an increase in warm/mild winters, it has not been all bad since then here. This winter is pretty much bottom of the barrel for here. 

[LibertyBell]

1 minute ago, michsnowfreak said:

Again that's just my observation locally. And while the 2015-16 nino certainly did herald in the end of the glory days era and an increase in warm/mild winters, it has not been all bad since then here. This winter is pretty much bottom of the barrel for here. 

Definitely had some good winters since then like 2017-18 and 2020-21 but the main effect aside from the awful last 2-3 winters was a huge bump in winter time temperatures.  NYC has a total of 6 DJF average temperatures of 40 F or higher and 5 of them have happened since 2000.

 

[michsnowfreak]

8 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

Definitely had some good winters since then like 2017-18 and 2020-21 but the main effect aside from the awful last 2-3 winters was a huge bump in winter time temperatures.  NYC has a total of 6 DJF average temperatures of 40 F or higher and 5 of them have happened since 2000.

 

Yeah we have had 5 unusually mild winters the last 9 years here, so hoping that comes to an end. But again, the previous 9 winters before that were MUCH colder and featured record snowfall, so all patterns do change eventually. Whether or not we see that change begin next year, I have no clue. It would seem a few neutral years would help but ENSO wants to just go wild anymore lol. Like anyone, I'm always most worried about my backyard, and mild winters here are not an issue for getting snowfall. All out torch months like this winters Dec & Feb, along with poor storm tracks, are what ruins winter here.

[40/70 Benchmark]

1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:

Definitely had some good winters since then like 2017-18 and 2020-21 but the main effect aside from the awful last 2-3 winters was a huge bump in winter time temperatures.  NYC has a total of 6 DJF average temperatures of 40 F or higher and 5 of them have happened since 2000.

 

2017-2018 was my last good winter....I was still over 10" below average snowfall in 2020-2021.

[LibertyBell]

13 minutes ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

2017-2018 was my last good winter....I was still over 10" below average snowfall in 2020-2021.

yeah it was mostly an inland winter we were on the edge of the heavier snows

[LibertyBell]

1 hour ago, michsnowfreak said:

Yeah we have had 5 unusually mild winters the last 9 years here, so hoping that comes to an end. But again, the previous 9 winters before that were MUCH colder and featured record snowfall, so all patterns do change eventually. Whether or not we see that change begin next year, I have no clue. It would seem a few neutral years would help but ENSO wants to just go wild anymore lol. Like anyone, I'm always most worried about my backyard, and mild winters here are not an issue for getting snowfall. All out torch months like this winters Dec & Feb, along with poor storm tracks, are what ruins winter here.

if December is bad then thats a sign for not much snow for us too-- 2014-15 was the only major recent exception

[40/70 Benchmark]

12 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

yeah it was mostly an inland winter we were on the edge of the heavier snows

No, Boston did fine...I just got screwed.

[thunderbolt]

Up to July

[michsnowfreak]

Does anyone have a link to yearly ACE numbers? @raindancewx has me Intrigued lol.

[TheClimateChanger]

On 2/25/2024 at 2:08 PM, michsnowfreak said:

I had never really heard of ACE until recently. Is it something that we can put on par with things like NAO, PDO, etc? And how high does this year's ACE rank? I may have missed it earlier in the thread.

 

What's ironic looking at the top 10 highest ACE years and following winters, the worst one here was 1995-96, and that was a product of being in a cold, dry screwzone. It was a cold winter, just a nightmare of missed snow chances. Most of the others were good winters, and nearly all had an abnormally snowy month (a common characteristic of ninas locally as well). But the best takeaway is that none of them were close to the widespread atrocity this winter was. 

Weird. That was a top 5-10 snowy winter for many locations in the Great Lakes [Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Buffalo, Erie]. Heck, Charleston, WV had 106.0" of snow that winter! That's nearly a foot more than Detroit's top snowy winter (2013-2014) and about 27" more than second place. This is why I remember Detroit as a snowhole. Growing up, there was frequently less snow in NW Ohio & SE Michigan than most places in ALL directions.

[GaWx]

1 hour ago, michsnowfreak said:

Does anyone have a link to yearly ACE numbers? @raindancewx has me Intrigued lol.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accumulated_cyclone_energy

Top 10 ACE years/snowfall following cold season

1933 NYC: 52.0”; BOS: 62.7”

2005 NYC: 40.0”; BOS: 39.9”

1893 NYC: 39.2”; BOS: 64.0”

1926 NYC: 22.3”; BOS: 41.1”

1995 NYC: 75.6”; BOS: 107.6”

2004 NYC: 41.0”; BOS: 86.6”

2017 NYC: 40.9”; BOS: 59.9”

1950 NYC: 9.3”; BOS: 29.7”

1961 NYC: 18.1”; BOS: 44.7”

1998 NYC: 12.7”; BOS: 36.4”

 

AVG NYC:  35.1” vs 28.5” mean (23% above mean) all years since 1868-9; 1 MAN, 5 AN, 0 NN, 2 BN, 2 MBN; 60% above median

 

AVG BOS: 57.3” vs 43.1” mean (33% above mean) all years since 1890-2; 2 MAN, 3 AN, 4 NN, 1 BN, 0 MBN; 70% above median

 

 If you get a chance, calculate the mean/median for these same 10 years for Detroit. Each season’s snowfall can be obtained here:

https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=dtx

 I’m curious to see what you find. Also, DC folks can go here for their snow:

 https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=lwx

 

[raindancewx]

Google is your friend.

https://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Realtime/index.php?arch&loc=northatlantic

[michsnowfreak]

20 hours ago, GaWx said:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accumulated_cyclone_energy

Top 10 ACE years/snowfall following cold season

1933 NYC: 52.0”; BOS: 62.7”

2005 NYC: 40.0”; BOS: 39.9”

1893 NYC: 39.2”; BOS: 64.0”

1926 NYC: 22.3”; BOS: 41.1”

1995 NYC: 75.6”; BOS: 107.6”

2004 NYC: 41.0”; BOS: 86.6”

2017 NYC: 40.9”; BOS: 59.9”

1950 NYC: 9.3”; BOS: 29.7”

1961 NYC: 18.1”; BOS: 44.7”

1998 NYC: 12.7”; BOS: 36.4”

 

AVG NYC:  35.1” vs 28.5” mean (23% above mean) all years since 1868-9; 1 MAN, 5 AN, 0 NN, 2 BN, 2 MBN; 60% above median

 

AVG BOS: 57.3” vs 43.1” mean (33% above mean) all years since 1890-2; 2 MAN, 3 AN, 4 NN, 1 BN, 0 MBN; 70% above median

 

 If you get a chance, calculate the mean/median for these same 10 years for Detroit. Each season’s snowfall can be obtained here:

https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=dtx

 I’m curious to see what you find. Also, DC folks can go here for their snow:

 https://www.weather.gov/wrh/Climate?wfo=lwx

 

Top 10 ACE years/snowfall following cold season

1933 DTW: 42.6"

2005 DTW: 36.3"

1893 DTW: 45.5"

1926 DTW: 46.3"

1995 DTW: 27.6"

2004 DTW: 63.8"

2017 DTW: 61.0"

1950 DTW: 42.2"

1961 DTW: 28.1"

1998 DTW: 49.5"

AVG DTW: 44.3” vs 41.1” mean (8% above mean) all years since 1874; 2 MAN, 3 AN, 2 NN, 2 BN, 1 MBN; 7 out of 10 above median.

 

I also note that for Modoki La Ninas snowfall is also above avg:

1973-74: 49.2"

1975-76: 55.9"

1983-84: 51.8"

1988-89: 25.1"

1998-99: 49.5"

2000-01: 39.0"

2008-09: 65.7"

2010-11: 69.1"

2016-17: 37.9"

Avg: 49.2 vs 41.1” mean (20% above mean) all years since 1874.

 

Question though and I apologize if I missed it. Are we just assuming this years ACE will be high? Or is it a foregone conclusion?

[GaWx]

6 hours ago, michsnowfreak said:

Top 10 ACE years/snowfall following cold season

1933 DTW: 42.6"

2005 DTW: 36.3"

1893 DTW: 45.5"

1926 DTW: 46.3"

1995 DTW: 27.6"

2004 DTW: 63.8"

2017 DTW: 61.0"

1950 DTW: 42.2"

1961 DTW: 28.1"

1998 DTW: 49.5"

AVG DTW: 44.3” vs 41.1” mean (8% above mean) all years since 1874; 2 MAN, 3 AN, 2 NN, 2 BN, 1 MBN; 7 out of 10 above median.

 

I also note that for Modoki La Ninas snowfall is also above avg:

1973-74: 49.2"

1975-76: 55.9"

1983-84: 51.8"

1988-89: 25.1"

1998-99: 49.5"

2000-01: 39.0"

2008-09: 65.7"

2010-11: 69.1"

2016-17: 37.9"

Avg: 49.2 vs 41.1” mean (20% above mean) all years since 1874.

 

Question though and I apologize if I missed it. Are we just assuming this years ACE will be high? Or is it a foregone conclusion?

ACE level is never close to a foregone conclusion.

[michsnowfreak]

16 minutes ago, GaWx said:

ACE level is never close to a foregone conclusion.

I figured. In any event it will be interesting to see how the season does unfold. it will also be interesting to see how la nina develops. Certainly early signs are encouraging here for a MUCH better winter next year, but a lllllong way to go.

[Ed, snow and hurricane fan]

On 2/29/2024 at 8:07 PM, raindancewx said:

Google is your friend.

https://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Realtime/index.php?arch&loc=northatlantic

Interesting.  I think part of it is a shift to a slower pattern in the 70s and 80s, but the satellite era didn't produce a detectable shift to named storms.