summer blizzard

As we are a week on, do we have another stratospheric update.

Sub Surface has hit -3 close to the dateline. Tropical convection might weaken this in the next few weeks but it's likely come late Feb and March that this returns. One last hurrah and then this Nino goes.. Geronimo.

17JAN2024: Nino3: 1.9 , Nino3.4: 1.7, Nino4: 1.4

@raz.org.rain It's worth saying that 2003 is a relatively poor PDO match for 2024 (likely) and 1990 is a poor QBO match (likely). Currently i would say the chances of the event actually ending are reasonable, we've not seen any statistical abnormality that would suggest a 2015 persistance however sub-surface SST's are still relatively neutral and we are still seeing WWB progression so we are not yet seeing a Nina flip signal outside modelling (which are typically too agressive on the up and down).

@Addicks Fan 1981 2019 saw a strong +IOD develop which is unlikely since the Indian Ocean is already fighting this. We could have a hot summer though if we see Nino slowly dwindle without a significant shift to Nina. 2003 and 1990 are examples. If we see a flip then we are looking at 2016, 2010, 2007 as better examples, not guaranteed to be bad but probably not all that good.

While not deep, it had repeated frontal snow events and is thus the snowiest winter since 2013.

Jan 21 was a great month here.

El Nino springs tend to be relatively cool between about mid Feb and mid April whether we get a SSW or not. They tend to feature May warmth. -QBO is only likely to enhance that.

I basically like abnormally cold from July to February but actually I love spring warmth, it has very low humidity normally. March 12 honestly spoiled me and made me completely flip. In terms of how things look, although it appears that Nino has peaked, it's probably not going to collapse in a 2010 style crater (basically one neutral month then Nina) which means that we can reasonably assume that we are looking at Nino, -QBO and -PDO. Generally speaking I see a good chance that spring will be relatively cool with average to cool (and likely damp) March and April before a warmer than average May.

ONI increased to +1.97 in December which is likely the event peak. OND ONI increased to +1.9. NDJ will come in at +2.0 or +1.9 depending how the final two January figures look. ND MEI increased to +1.1.

Nino has peaked. No westerlies in the ENSO zone until at least early February. Sub-surface profile is now polarized to neutral close to the dateline. SST's are now responding.

Suprising though it is, we have our 5th snow upon which snow has fallen this winter and 7th which has seen lying snow too albeit its thin.

10JAN2024: Nino3: 2.0 , Nino3.4: 1.9, Nino4: 1.5

I'd not worry about the warm sector too much, it's not actually that warm. This is just a pleasent suprise albeit i'd not get too excited as its forecast to weaken later in the day.

Event number 4, day 6 of the winter. Radar is gold, more snow incoming. Moderate on radar.

Quite a change from the Euro, we basically get the breakdown front through and then a Bartlett builds.

I recall watching a Met Office Video where they basically showed that the reason for our summers was a cyclical decadal -AO cycle similar to the 1960's. While I'm not certain if it's linked, there was also a change in the West African Monsoon cycle to wet from 09 onwards, that's a cycle that lasts about 20 years and tends to wet the Sahel. Don't really agree with the multi year link as opposed to a year. 2003 and 2018 are much better explained by their own weaker events and moderate to strong NIno's simply not being conducive to a warm summer pattern here normally.

It's always interesting to think there are now people here who don't remember 07-12 and can only reference statistics (for those of us here back then, it sticks in the memory like 09-10-13 does for summer. But yeah, 07 and 12 were basically a dream for those of us who dislike summer and we're truly horrific for the majority on here. Akin to winter 2014. Summer 2008 was horrifically dull and generally wet and cool. Summer 2011 while dry ish was the coolest in about 25 years and basically devoid of heat after the opening days of June. Summer 2009 is remembered by those who only look at statistics as being okay but in actuality it was what we can call a plume fail summer. Basically in June and August it tended to be humid but outside the south east it was barely memorable as the heat would always plume to our east. Summer 2010 is the one people forget most and glorify but in reality June was about as average nationally as you can get and from about the 10th July, summer was basically done north of Yorkshire, August was pretty cool and wet and I recall Scotland recording some abnormally cool temperatures. It gets glorified a little because from mid June to mid July the south east did get a great 25C period but here In Yorkshire the frontal boundary basically just sat north of us so it was a cloudy, humid month and north of us completely forgettable. Essentially a summer of 2 halves but with the first half at maybe 6/10 only nationally. So basically very poor summers generally with perhaps only summer 2009 trying (and failing) to produce something consistently warm.

It was very much a southern thing was 2022 before August. Somebody who lives in Manchester and London on here was illustrating earlier last year how the maxima in London were indicative of a proper 2 week 25+ hotspell basically making it a summer of two halves however in Manchester (and it fits with my own memory here), we basically had 2 hot days and 3 or 4 warm days scattered in tht two weeks. August 2022 was more national, probably because it was UK/Scandi High based.

Small changes from the Euro that May have been missed. So firstly the low on the 19th has a bit more negative tilt delaying the breakdown an extra day to the 21st. The low is also weaker. Then the second low instead of zipping north east, moves south east. The crux is that while we end up with a +AO, there’s enough amplification that high pressure keeps everything north of most of England/Wales. So as I said yesterday, don’t be shocked if the outcome is much more high pressure influenced than zonal.

Speaking for here they were not comparable. 2018 was spectacular from May through mid-August. It was dry, it was hot, it was sunny and only in mid-July to mid-August did we see humidity become an issue. It even had spectacular storms here in late May and July. 2022 here was meh until 2 hot days in July. We then finally got a hot first half to August and warm afterwards until about mid-September. In terms of duration we probably only have 2003 that compares to 2018 albeit 06 and 95 had stonking 60 day or so periods that were perhaps better. Would probably put May-June 18 just behind June-July 06 myself but I was too young to remember much from 95 and 97 (don't think 03 was comparable). For me I'd actually say that July-August 22 ranks behind July-August 13.

While not good it’s worth saying that the GEM and GFS keep some vortex separation which may suggest a better chance of a pressure build outcome even if a Euro/Sceuro High.

I prefer my summer to be May-July as per 2018 or 2006 so last year was quite good on the heat front albeit the low pressure spell afterwards was much too humid unlike recent summers with a poor back end.

27DEC2023: Nino3: 2.1 , Nino3.4: 2.0, Nino4: 1.4 03JAN2024: Nino3: 2.0 , Nino3.4: 1.9, Nino4: 1.4

GFS and GEM basically have two much interaction with the tropospheric lobes near Greenland. Euro keeps these seperate throughout. In theory, modelling tends to weaken lows closer to the time which suggests less interaction but that is not guaranteed.