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2020-2021 Winter: Early Thoughts

Fountainguy97 said:
I always enjoy using the tidbits SST analysis as an analog set. Here is the Analysis. It is a month long analysis of the current SST. Not my analogs, These are the years that are as close to this years SST's as possible. No other variables are taken into account.

View attachment 48994

All of these years are pretty strong analogs for the current SST pattern across the globe with an east based La Nina.
17-18 proved we can rock and roll in an East based La Nina and a lot of these analogs would make a lot of us happy.

Temps:

View attachment 48993View attachment 48992View attachment 48998


And I pulled out the snowfall maps for these years as well. Snowfall is much harder to predict due to the lack of events across a lot of our areas. Looks like feast or famine.

View attachment 48995View attachment 48996

View attachment 48991


The common theme in all of my light research into this winter and East Based La Nina's in general seems to point toward January being the best shot for cold and snow. It seems that East based Nina's are more kind to us as a whole.
Click to expand...

Nice write up! Lets see if we can’t get lucky this go round.


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Fountainguy97 said:
I always enjoy using the tidbits SST analysis as an analog set. Here is the Analysis. It is a month long analysis of the current SST. Not my analogs, These are the years that are as close to this years SST's as possible. No other variables are taken into account.

View attachment 48994

All of these years are pretty strong analogs for the current SST pattern across the globe with an east based La Nina.
17-18 proved we can rock and roll in an East based La Nina and a lot of these analogs would make a lot of us happy.

Temps:

View attachment 48993View attachment 48992View attachment 48998


And I pulled out the snowfall maps for these years as well. Snowfall is much harder to predict due to the lack of events across a lot of our areas. Looks like feast or famine.

View attachment 48995View attachment 48996

View attachment 48991


The common theme in all of my light research into this winter and East Based La Nina's in general seems to point toward January being the best shot for cold and snow. It seems that East based Nina's are more kind to us as a whole.
Click to expand...
That H5 pattern Looks sorta similar to what we’re about to deal with if the LR models are right, some nice blocking....
 
I’ll be nice and hold off on what I want to say in response to the above right now so some of y’all can dream this weekend. Besides, there’s way too much else going on in the shorter term, including a very pleasant weekend with the first true walk worthy autumn wx coming! Furthermore, I always enjoy winter relative to summer, regardless of how it turns out. I’m already predicting at least a 25-30 F temperature drop from this summer along with a big drop in humidity!

PS I will add this. There’s almost always a decent chance for a week or two of solid BN even in the warmest of winters.
 
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Perhaps someone that has researched this could help more. I have read a paper how CO2 emmisions has continued to rise each year. Since the global shutdown i decided to do a little digging. The good news is that the CO2 is dropping and its dropping faster then the past. I believe this is a temporary affect due to COVID. The current PPM we are at for last month was 412.55. The highest for this year was: 417.07 ppm. Without more data and time i can formulate a hypothesis that while the CO2 increases our chances for wintry weather decreases in the southeast.

Data:

2019 6 2019.458 413.93 413.93 411.53 27
2019 7 2019.542 411.74 411.74 411.39 25
2019 8 2019.625 409.95 409.95 411.87 29
2019 9 2019.708 408.54 408.54 412.15 29
2019 10 2019.792 408.52 408.52 411.96 29
2019 11 2019.875 410.25 410.25 412.26 26
2019 12 2019.958 411.76 411.76 412.44 31
2020 1 2020.042 413.39 413.39 413.09 29
2020 2 2020.125 414.11 414.11 413.26 28
2020 3 2020.208 414.51 414.51 413.04 26
2020 4 2020.292 416.21 416.21 413.42 28
2020 5 2020.375 417.07 417.07 413.58 27
2020 6 2020.458 416.38 416.38 413.99 27
2020 7 2020.542 414.38 414.38 414.04 31
2020 8 2020.625 412.55 412.55 414.48 25









ftp://aftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/products/trends/co2/co2_mm_mlo.txt


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Myfrotho704_ said:
That H5 pattern Looks sorta similar to what we’re about to deal with if the LR models are right, some nice blocking....
Click to expand...
SD is all aboard at least 1 extreme pac ridging period with a major cold dump into the US. I may have said this before but I personally believe last winter wouldn't have been as crappy if we didn't have the mega vortex chopping off any attempt at HLB. I also know that house money is on warmth this winter but there are a couple of ways we could sneak around the warmth and actually get into a much more average winter temp wise.
 
Fountainguy97 said:
I always enjoy using the tidbits SST analysis as an analog set. Here is the Analysis. It is a month long analysis of the current SST. Not my analogs, These are the years that are as close to this years SST's as possible. No other variables are taken into account.


All of these years are pretty strong analogs for the current SST pattern across the globe with an east based La Nina.
17-18 proved we can rock and roll in an East based La Nina and a lot of these analogs would make a lot of us happy.

Temps:



And I pulled out the snowfall maps for these years as well. Snowfall is much harder to predict due to the lack of events across a lot of our areas. Looks like feast or famine.




The common theme in all of my light research into this winter and East Based La Nina's in general seems to point toward January being the best shot for cold and snow. It seems that East based Nina's are more kind to us as a whole.
Click to expand...

I had season totals over a foot on 3 of those so I hope these analogs are correct.
 
StormStalker said:
Is there any coorelation to an active hurricane season and winter weather in the east/southeast?
Click to expand...
For BHM I looked at the 2005/2006(closest time wise of this active of a tropical season) and nothing winter weather wise was mentioned of any consequence for the end of 2005 beginning 2006...
 
If I was to release a winter forecast out right now (take with a extremely small grain of sand) this is what I would go with
December 33E75BA9-82B8-4182-917F-33440FA1CD2F.jpeg
January BB6C24F2-A30C-4600-B46E-AF9F8E116DD9.jpeg
February 55E06BD7-0435-499D-94FA-594526217986.jpeg
Average it out for DJF and much of the SE would still end up quite AN, but not as bad as the last few winters
 
December 2010 was a moderate-strong La Niña and it was awesome. Well below normal temperatures with several events here in NC.

It is remarkable how long we have gone without a significant Arctic outbreak in December. This year seems to be changing up the late September pattern, maybe it will lead to a cooler December as well?

This cool weather has me thinking snow.
 
CyclonicFury said:
December 2010 was a moderate-strong La Niña and it was awesome. Well below normal temperatures with several events here in NC.

It is remarkable how long we have gone without a significant Arctic outbreak in December. This year seems to be changing up the late September pattern, maybe it will lead to a cooler December as well?

This cool weather has me thinking snow.
Click to expand...


Still the deepest snow I’ve ever seen. Was ironically visiting family for Christmas where I now live. Snowed for 2 straight days. Measured 13inches all over the yard and I’m sure there was compaction.

Man what a Christmas that was. A foot+ falling through the holiday.
7F6DB17E-B5BE-4FEE-9734-9AAEBFB7BB9D.png
 
cd2play said:
If nothing else, hopefully December at least resembles a winter month. It just doesn't feel much like Christmas with December averaging 5+ degrees above normal
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With the exception of 2017 December has been so warm lately, warmer than November in many years, I almost can't even think of it as a winter month anymore. Hopefully that changes this year. With a La Niña it just might.
 
cd2play said:
If nothing else, hopefully December at least resembles a winter month. It just doesn't feel much like Christmas with December averaging 5+ degrees above normal
Click to expand...

Do we want to torch January though? Is a colder December and possibly February better?


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wxdaniel said:
Do we want to torch January though? Is a colder December and possibly February better?


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Click to expand...
Me personally I'd like to not torch at all. But its inevitable we'll torch one or two months, or even all three like the past decade!
 
RainlessSnowless & Grumpy said:
Me personally I'd like to not torch at all. But its inevitable we'll torch one or two months, or even all three like the past decade!
Click to expand...

If we want to not torch we need this pattern to change. I can’t believe this but the LAST time a DJF month had a negative NAO average was February 2013... and it was barely negative. You have to reach ALL the way back to 09-10 and 10-11 to find the first winters with solid -nao. That’s nearly a decade ago.

We all know there are so many moving pieces to our winters but there is no way this is not atleast one of the glaring problems as far as getting cold into the SE over the last decade.

824DBB86-4E15-49CA-B4C9-CF3286BA7AC1.jpeg

BTW here is the temps for 09-10, 10-11 and then the rest of the decade.
Again I understand there are so many other pieces but still.

EA274744-4F5C-4B50-976A-6402485FD25E.png16E82711-1A34-4E68-A10E-3BB378028986.png

look familiar?

76544D1B-4B65-4E88-A69B-9E6C3D90BA49.png6EFF6656-9EDE-481D-9E11-91425E12314E.png

I love this thesis examining snowfall of the southern Appalachian mountains. Lots of deep reading but the bottom has pictures! Lol

Click Here for Paper

here is a screenshot of the breakdown of snowfall across the regions of the southern mountains. Hard to see but all you need to know is red is -nao. Blue is +nao. You can see most regions average double the snowfall in -nao regardless of enso state.

For me, step one is seeing a -nao period longer than a week.

D4376AFA-FD0B-4240-8F84-E797435BF489.jpeg
 
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We had good winters in 13-14 and 14-15 for most areas, so I'm assuming you don't need a -NAO to lock in for the entire winter for a decent period of cold and snow.
 
SETNwx said:
We had good winters in 13-14 and 14-15 for most areas, so I'm assuming you don't need a -NAO to lock in for the entire winter for a decent period of cold and snow.
Click to expand...

for sure. More so I think we are talking about a greater chance of cold in -nao. But cold doesn’t automatically mean more snow.

I’ve started thinking strictly what brings a higher chance of cold. More cold naturally increases the snow chance. Snow chances down south are pretty much impossible to accurately predict year to year
 
Fountainguy97 said:
for sure. More so I think we are talking about a greater chance of cold in -nao. But cold doesn’t automatically mean more snow.

I’ve started thinking strictly what brings a higher chance of cold. More cold naturally increases the snow chance. Snow chances down south are pretty much impossible to accurately predict year to year
Click to expand...
The -NAO helps to keep the cold air anchored in place longer which in turn increases the snow chances and we aren’t relying as much on perfect timing. ‘13-‘14 and ‘14-‘15 were certainly decent winters for most of us from a snow standpoint, but we still ended up slightly above average temp wise both of those winters... we just simply lucked out on the timing during periods of a +PNA. One thing to note this winter, if we get any kind of extended blocking this year, their are a lot of places that are overdue now for a major snow... Southern Piedmont NC and Upstate SC (south of I-85), SC Midlands, and Northern and Central GA. These areas often do very well with southern sliders and it just seems like it’s been forever since we saw one.
 
SD said:
Lot's of smoke being put into the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere from the western US and Siberian wildfires. Have to think there will be some effect on the late fall early winter pattern
Click to expand...
...which would be?
 
Sleet City USA said:
Whatever you say, as long as it says “cooler” I’m all in!
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Not saying it's a 1-1 correlation but I saw some comparisons to the 2017 smoke plume on twitter. We went normal Sept, above normal Oct, then below normal for Nov, Dec, Jan. Just some food for thought on the contrary to the mega warm forecasts being thrown out. If we can weaken the pv and allow more HLB you can certainly attempt to mitigate an unfavorable IO
 
SD said:
Not saying it's a 1-1 correlation but I saw some comparisons to the 2017 smoke plume on twitter. We went normal Sept, above normal Oct, then below normal for Nov, Dec, Jan. Just some food for thought on the contrary to the mega warm forecasts being thrown out. If we can weaken the pv and allow more HLB you can certainly attempt to mitigate an unfavorable IO
Click to expand...
Send that stinking polar vortex for Europe it almost always favors the eastern us !
 
It is interesting how 2017-19 all had a below normal November to be followed by an above normal DJF (though 2017-18 had a BN DJ followed by a well AN February). 2018 and 2019 proved that a super cold November doesn't necessarily mean the entire winter will be cold. November 2019 was barely colder than January 2020 in some areas.
 
SD said:
Not saying it's a 1-1 correlation but I saw some comparisons to the 2017 smoke plume on twitter. We went normal Sept, above normal Oct, then below normal for Nov, Dec, Jan. Just some food for thought on the contrary to the mega warm forecasts being thrown out. If we can weaken the pv and allow more HLB you can certainly attempt to mitigate an unfavorable IO
Click to expand...
Certainly like seeing that consistent Scandinavian ridging, can it last though
 
CyclonicFury said:
It is interesting how 2017-19 all had a below normal November to be followed by an above normal DJF (though 2017-18 had a BN DJ followed by a well AN February). 2018 and 2019 proved that a super cold November doesn't necessarily mean the entire winter will be cold. November 2019 was barely colder than January 2020 in some areas.
Click to expand...
Very overdue a warm November ! I want it , bring it on.
 
SD said:
Not saying it's a 1-1 correlation but I saw some comparisons to the 2017 smoke plume on twitter. We went normal Sept, above normal Oct, then below normal for Nov, Dec, Jan. Just some food for thought on the contrary to the mega warm forecasts being thrown out. If we can weaken the pv and allow more HLB you can certainly attempt to mitigate an unfavorable IO
Click to expand...
Word on the street is that the air is clean, due to COVID. Maybe colder winter? Or then again, maybe just means more earthquakes in NW NC. ?‍♂️
 
Rain Cold said:
Word on the street is that the air is clean, due to COVID. Maybe colder winter? Or then again, maybe just means more earthquakes in NW NC.
Click to expand...

I have read about this earlier in the month. If it means we reduce manufactory for colder and better seasons Im all for it....wait


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