WunderBlog Archive » Category 6™
Category 6 has moved! See the latest from Dr. Jeff Masters and Bob Henson here.Winter forecast
Hello, Aaron here. Dr. Masters is on vacation and has taken an oath NOT to blog while out. He did leave some blogs for me to post periodically during that time. Here's the first one:
This Fall's ongoing El Ni�o event shows no signs of going away, and may grow stronger, according to the latest El Ni�o advisory issued last week by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center. The strength of an El Ni�o event is measured by how far above average the Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) in a region near the Equator off the Pacific coast of South America are. These SSTs are about 1 degree C above normal right now, qualifying this as a moderate El Ni�o event. A weak El Ni�o event has SSTs .5 degrees C above normal, and a strong one, 2 degrees C above normal. The strongest El Ni�o on record, in 1997, had SSTs 2.5 degrees C above normal.
The SSTs in the El Ni�o region are forecast to remain between .5 C and 2.0 C above normal through springtime by all of the El Ni�o models, so we can expect typical El Ni�o weather throughout this winter. This likely means warmer than average temperatures over western and central Canada, and over the western and northern United States. Wetter than average conditions can be expected over portions of the U.S. Gulf Coast and Florida, and drier than average conditions in the Ohio Valley and the Pacific Northwest. Global effects during November through March will likely include drier than average weather over Malaysia, Indonesia, the tropical North Pacific, northern South America, and southeastern Africa, and wetter than average conditions over equatorial East Africa, central South America (Uruguay, northeastern Argentina, and southern Brazil) and along the coasts of Ecuador and northern Peru.
It was a surprise to me to look at the global temperature forecast for the winter (Figure 1) and see NO areas with an above average chance to be cooler than normal. Usually, there is at least one region of the globe expected to be on the cool side of things. If this forecast verifies, 2006 should rank as one of the five warmest years on record, and may challenge 1997 and 2005 as the warmest year on record.
Figure 1. This winter's temperature forecast for the world from Columbia University's International Research Institute for Climate and Society.
Figure 2. This winter's precipitation forecast for the world from Columbia University's International Research Institute for Climate and Society.
Jeff Masters
This Fall's ongoing El Ni�o event shows no signs of going away, and may grow stronger, according to the latest El Ni�o advisory issued last week by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center. The strength of an El Ni�o event is measured by how far above average the Sea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) in a region near the Equator off the Pacific coast of South America are. These SSTs are about 1 degree C above normal right now, qualifying this as a moderate El Ni�o event. A weak El Ni�o event has SSTs .5 degrees C above normal, and a strong one, 2 degrees C above normal. The strongest El Ni�o on record, in 1997, had SSTs 2.5 degrees C above normal.
The SSTs in the El Ni�o region are forecast to remain between .5 C and 2.0 C above normal through springtime by all of the El Ni�o models, so we can expect typical El Ni�o weather throughout this winter. This likely means warmer than average temperatures over western and central Canada, and over the western and northern United States. Wetter than average conditions can be expected over portions of the U.S. Gulf Coast and Florida, and drier than average conditions in the Ohio Valley and the Pacific Northwest. Global effects during November through March will likely include drier than average weather over Malaysia, Indonesia, the tropical North Pacific, northern South America, and southeastern Africa, and wetter than average conditions over equatorial East Africa, central South America (Uruguay, northeastern Argentina, and southern Brazil) and along the coasts of Ecuador and northern Peru.
It was a surprise to me to look at the global temperature forecast for the winter (Figure 1) and see NO areas with an above average chance to be cooler than normal. Usually, there is at least one region of the globe expected to be on the cool side of things. If this forecast verifies, 2006 should rank as one of the five warmest years on record, and may challenge 1997 and 2005 as the warmest year on record.
Figure 1. This winter's temperature forecast for the world from Columbia University's International Research Institute for Climate and Society.
Figure 2. This winter's precipitation forecast for the world from Columbia University's International Research Institute for Climate and Society.
Jeff Masters
The views of the author are his/her own and do not necessarily represent the position of The Weather Company or its parent, IBM.