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How will Solar Minimum affect weather and climate?


JeffC

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Posted
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
  • Weather Preferences: Heavy disruptive snowfall.
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
31 minutes ago, lassie23 said:

Anything but drizzle will do

I don't think you can be that specific TBH when talking about the effects of solar min so wouldn't worry just yet:laugh:

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Posted
  • Location: Edmonton Alberta(via Chelmsford, Exeter & Calgary)
  • Weather Preferences: Sunshine and 15-25c
  • Location: Edmonton Alberta(via Chelmsford, Exeter & Calgary)
3 hours ago, lassie23 said:

Anything but drizzle will do

i will take drizzle over snow all day long.

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Posted
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire
  • Weather Preferences: Snow, storms and other extremes
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire

Not too sure to be honest.

I had a feeling back in February/March that last winter may have been the curtain raiser to a run of colder winters in the coming years, similar to how 2008/2009 was. The ECM seasonal run has certainly opened my eyes somewhat as I had largely written off this coming winter.

I have read that next winter may see all of the large scale teleconnections align favourably so it's possible 2019/2020 winter may have a good run at that 62/63 style season? I've heard mumblings about the 2019/2020 winter for a few years now, so maybe there's something in it?

Edited by CreweCold
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Posted
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
  • Weather Preferences: Heavy disruptive snowfall.
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
3 hours ago, CreweCold said:

Not too sure to be honest.

I had a feeling back in February/March that last winter may have been the curtain raiser to a run of colder winters in the coming years, similar to how 2008/2009 was. The ECM seasonal run has certainly opened my eyes somewhat as I had largely written off this coming winter.

I have read that next winter may see all of the large scale teleconnections align favourably so it's possible 2019/2020 winter may have a good run at that 62/63 style season? I've heard mumblings about the 2019/2020 winter for a few years now, so maybe there's something in it?

Last year when Gavin was building his analogues on his winter update videos, the ones coming out the season after the solar min season were much better than the actual one round about solar min. I think (but don't hold me to it) 62-62 came out, this winter from a solar POV came out as not as favourable as last winter, definitely  a -QBO loads the dice big time around 18 months after solar min in favour of a very cold winter, but that's my main drawback, will the -QBO have downwelled soon enough to affect the NH pattern by then? or will it just load the dice in favour of a similar late winter / spring to this one just gone.

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Posted
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire
  • Weather Preferences: Snow, storms and other extremes
  • Location: Crewe, Cheshire
5 hours ago, feb1991blizzard said:

Last year when Gavin was building his analogues on his winter update videos, the ones coming out the season after the solar min season were much better than the actual one round about solar min. I think (but don't hold me to it) 62-62 came out, this winter from a solar POV came out as not as favourable as last winter, definitely  a -QBO loads the dice big time around 18 months after solar min in favour of a very cold winter, but that's my main drawback, will the -QBO have downwelled soon enough to affect the NH pattern by then? or will it just load the dice in favour of a similar late winter / spring to this one just gone.

I personally think too much stock is placed in the QBO. It's merely one piece of the jigsaw and some wQBO years have produced memorable winters.

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Posted
  • Location: Dublin, Ireland
  • Weather Preferences: Cold, snowy winters and warm, sunny summers
  • Location: Dublin, Ireland

QBO vs CET for every Winter from 1949-50 to 2017-18. Easterly QBO years relatively favour colder Winters especially to severe levels but notice 1978-79 had very weak westerly QBO. Late 2010 had quite strong westerly QBO too.

167124131_QBOvsCET.thumb.png.cbd573bc72b7786f12f2678c94cfc5bd.png

Edited by BruenSryan
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Posted
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
  • Weather Preferences: Heavy disruptive snowfall.
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
5 hours ago, CreweCold said:

I personally think too much stock is placed in the QBO. It's merely one piece of the jigsaw and some wQBO years have produced memorable winters.

Taken in isolation, I agree, it means jack, this might sound controversial but my view is the same can be said for ENSO, apart from extremes of either +ve or -ve usually mean a mild Atlantic driven winter, I prefer ENSO neutral in fact, as then you don't run the risk of having too strong a nina or nino, loads of severe cold spells have occurred in ENSO neutral, I get where some of the teleconnective guru's are coming from wrt high AAM being required to amplify the higher latitude pattern but that still happened last year with a nina.  These tools are useful for seasonal forecasting though in conjunction with each other and with solar cycles, SSW's are actually more likely with a w-QBO in solar max's than an e-QBO in solar max's, but overall, solar min, e-qbo and moderate CP El nino is surely the best combination.

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Posted
  • Location: Exeter
  • Weather Preferences: Warm and sunny!
  • Location: Exeter
23 hours ago, Ed Stone said:

Aye ES, I can't really see much in the way of objective evidence for AFs' reliability; to me it seems that they exhibit varying degrees of wrongness, and none is ever right?

Not that they're pure guesswork, like the witterings of Madden and Corbyn et al. are, of course...

Problem is that it's impossible to directly test the accuracy of an analogue forecast (I mean it could be complete chance that it's correct).  I suppose there's no harm using them in conjunction with other forecasting means...

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Posted
  • Location: Beccles, Suffolk.
  • Weather Preferences: Thunder, snow, heat, sunshine...
  • Location: Beccles, Suffolk.
22 minutes ago, Evening Star said:

Problem is that it's impossible to directly test the accuracy of an analogue forecast (I mean it could be complete chance that it's correct).  I suppose there's no harm using them in conjunction with other forecasting means...

I think they would work (in a deterministic universe) had forecasters access to millions of times more data than they currently do ... I await room-temperature superconductors and/or quantum computing?

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Posted
  • Location: Redhill, Surrey
  • Weather Preferences: Southerly tracking LPs, heavy snow. Also 25c and calm
  • Location: Redhill, Surrey
22 hours ago, CreweCold said:

Not too sure to be honest.

I had a feeling back in February/March that last winter may have been the curtain raiser to a run of colder winters in the coming years, similar to how 2008/2009 was. The ECM seasonal run has certainly opened my eyes somewhat as I had largely written off this coming winter.

I have read that next winter may see all of the large scale teleconnections align favourably so it's possible 2019/2020 winter may have a good run at that 62/63 style season? I've heard mumblings about the 2019/2020 winter for a few years now, so maybe there's something in it?

Within next 3 years I strongly believe we will have a challenge to one of the 20th century greats. And this winter on will start to display DNA of winters experienced during 40s to 70s imo....before the 2nd anticipated step down as we come to the end of cycle 25.   

I think a very ‘seasonal’ December beckons

 

BFTP

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Posted
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
  • Weather Preferences: Heavy disruptive snowfall.
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
2 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

 

I think a very ‘seasonal’ December beckons

 

BFTP

Like this.

cfsnh-0-2154_ebl0.png

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Posted
  • Location: West-Belgium
  • Weather Preferences: Thunderstorms and winter weather
  • Location: West-Belgium

I also believe we will have three much colder than normal winters in a row now.

Edited by Lakigigar
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Posted
  • Location: Horsham, West sussex, 52m asl
  • Location: Horsham, West sussex, 52m asl

 

4 hours ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

Within next 3 years I strongly believe we will have a challenge to one of the 20th century greats. And this winter on will start to display DNA of winters experienced during 40s to 70s imo....before the 2nd anticipated step down as we come to the end of cycle 25.   

I think a very ‘seasonal’ December beckons

 

BFTP

 

19 minutes ago, Lakigigar said:

I also believe we will have three much colder than normal winters in a row now.

So do I. Though based on scientific fact and historical data, It's more a 'feeling' than anything else..

ZaMqRnu.thumb.jpg.49161e1200700b172906016a1a2f9eb3.jpg

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Posted
  • Location: Coniston, Cumbria 90m ASL
  • Weather Preferences: wintry
  • Location: Coniston, Cumbria 90m ASL

Pleased of started this thread and am slightly humbled that it has attracted the grand masters of netweather!!

Personally, I suspect we will see a humdinger of a winter in the next 2-3 years,low star activity promoting an already meandering jet stream meaning things get stuck!!

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Posted
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
  • Weather Preferences: Heavy disruptive snowfall.
  • Location: Manchester Deansgate.
1 minute ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

Reasonable.....

 

BFTP

The whole month was quality on that run, it was action packed with bitterly cold episodes and snow events, it was around a 4c -ve 850hpa anomaly.

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Posted
  • Location: Leigh-on-Sea
  • Location: Leigh-on-Sea

Out of interest, how often does a long range model output show something like that? (going back on previous winters) 

Do they regularly pop up in long range forecasts, but never actually happen because its obviously too far out to predict. Or is it quite rare to see a long range output like that? 

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Posted
  • Location: Redhill, Surrey
  • Weather Preferences: Southerly tracking LPs, heavy snow. Also 25c and calm
  • Location: Redhill, Surrey
6 hours ago, Rambo said:

Out of interest, how often does a long range model output show something like that? (going back on previous winters) 

Do they regularly pop up in long range forecasts, but never actually happen because its obviously too far out to predict. Or is it quite rare to see a long range output like that? 

Not uncommon unfortunately....it is after all the CFS

 

BFTP

Edited by BLAST FROM THE PAST
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Posted
  • Location: Leigh-on-Sea
  • Location: Leigh-on-Sea
1 hour ago, BLAST FROM THE PAST said:

Not uncommon unfortunately....it is after all the CFS

 

BFTP

Ok thanks.

So as much as I'm a believer in all this, I wont add those outputs to the list of reasons then lol

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Posted
  • Location: Reigate, Surrey
  • Location: Reigate, Surrey

If anyone doubts a link between solar minima and blocked winters, here's a couple of reanalysis charts for you featuring low solar Januaries since the 1950s. Also please note that although this set includes 1963, removing it makes little difference to the implied pattern. I felt justified in leaving it in since it was a low solar winter. Apologies if I've missed a year from this set that people think should be included.

Decembers also tend to be cold and February if anything is the warmest month of the winter relative to average. Most of these winters were not cold throughout, but they nearly all featured notable spells and there are quite a few severe months that occured. The coming winter is currently expected to have a weakish el nino on top which should give impetus to the southern jet and favour systems running into the blocking. The strength of that el nino may will influence how far North these systems are able to get. In theory we should be looking at a colder than average winter with some snowfall at times. The fly in the ointment right now is that Atlantic sea surface temperatures (cold, warm, cold tripole right now) do not currently support this forecast, but these may shift through the autumn.

VREJyhqAQd.png

hvXDS1QsNx.png

Edited by beng
Typo
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Posted
  • Location: Reigate, Surrey
  • Location: Reigate, Surrey

Steve Murr's raised an interesting point on one of the other threads regarding how we need to be careful with analogues as historic charts don't necessarily reflect conditions in the Arctic. This seems like a valid concern and there's no doubt that ice expanse has been very low over the last decade or so relative to the 60s-80s cold period.  I think there was a drop in ice coverage too in the late 30s, early 40s - but obviously we didn't have satellite coverage then, so whether this is a natural cycle relating to the AMO and PDO cycles - or a reflection of climate warming - that's a discussion for elsewhere as it'll only end in arguments and distract from what I want to show.

Attempting to take on board Steve's concerns, and reducing the dataset to only include years since the warm AMO began, we get the following Dec/Jan composites for solar minimum.  Now granted it's not great to reduce the amount of data in the composite for obvious reasons, but hey there's not much else we can really do here to try and see whether we should still expect the solar cycle induced pattern to hold in the modern day.

The good news for cold weather fans is that the blocking pattern is very much still there if we focus simply on the last 2 solar cycles; the main issues that could override it would seem to be:

2104829442_Decembersurfacepressuresolarmins.thumb.png.79bd0486cd2455aa8d8a3cc103756fff.png1695692968_Janchartsurfacepressuresolarmins.thumb.png.b0d8d53ebf2237af6e8468e1a029d09b.png

1.) Strong or Very Strong Enso event

2.) Strong Atlantic SST signal for mild.

It seems virtually impossible that 1 will play out, although a weak El Nino which seems possible could actually make this a more snowy pattern IMHO.

Issue 2 is is in play though in that Atlantic SSTs are currently favourable for a mild stormy winter, but these may change over the next couple of months.  If they don't, then it will be interesting to watch the battle between the atmosphere and the ocean to see how that pans out.  If the ocean overrides the solar cycle pattern this winter, I doubt it will next winter.

 

Edited by beng
fixed typo
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Posted
  • Location: Edmonton Alberta(via Chelmsford, Exeter & Calgary)
  • Weather Preferences: Sunshine and 15-25c
  • Location: Edmonton Alberta(via Chelmsford, Exeter & Calgary)
22 hours ago, beng said:

If anyone doubts a link between solar minima and blocked winters, here's a couple of reanalysis charts for you featuring low solar Januaries since the 1950s. Also please note that although this set includes 1963, removing it makes little difference to the implied pattern. I felt justified in leaving it in since it was a low solar winter. Apologies if I've missed a year from this set that people think should be included.

Decembers also tend to be cold and February if anything is the warmest month of the winter relative to average. Most of these winters were not cold throughout, but they nearly all featured notable spells and there are quite a few severe months that occured. The coming winter is currently expected to have a weakish el nino on top which should give impetus to the southern jet and favour systems running into the blocking. The strength of that el nino may will influence how far North these systems are able to get. In theory we should be looking at a colder than average winter with some snowfall at times. The fly in the ointment right now is that Atlantic sea surface temperatures (cold, warm, cold tripole right now) do not currently support this forecast, but these may shift through the autumn.

VREJyhqAQd.png

hvXDS1QsNx.png

My query is? when is a solar minimum not a solar minimum...seems you have only picked colder months that occurred close to or even close to mid cycle..for example Jan 2010 is 3 years after solar minimum..so what about Jan 2007,2006, or Jan 1998 etc

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