Meteorologists Point To Signs Of Another Upcoming “Nasty Winter For Europe” – Would Be Spectacular Sixth In A Row!

Bastardi_WeatherBELLIt started with the Farmer’s Almanac. We’ve been hearing lots of talk about another brutal winter being in store.

Photo right: weatherbell.com/

Although seasonal forecasts are speculative at best, meteorology indeed has advanced to a point where it is possible to get an idea of what direction the upcoming season is tending towards. Farmers have been doing this successfully for centuries.

Meteorologist Joe Bastardi in his Saturday Summary at the 7-minute mark looks at the latest NCEP NCAR global winter forecast for 2013/14. The charts point to another “brutal winter for Europe“. The forecast sees blocking and a negative NAO. Joe also tweeted that “SST analog package combined with low solar, and climate cycle (similar to early 50s)  argue for nasty Euro Winter“.

Joe is not alone in pointing out that weather services are looking at a brutal European winter. German meteorologist Dominik Jung tweeted the following chart from the French CFS meteorological services which shows really nasty cold in store for January.

Jung_CFS_French

German meteorologist Dominik Jung tweets that a bitter cold one could be in store for Europe. Chart: CFS

Moreover, the online web.de/magazine here carries the title: “Winter 2013/2014 is going to be really cold”, citing “one of the most well-known long-term models of the American Weather Service“.

Web.de writes:

It looks like the 2013/2014 winter is going to be extremely frosty. Jung has evaluated the data: ‘Looking at these charts, it’s going to be really cold.'”

Web.de adds that signs show the winter could be a long, protracted affair:

The cold air flow from Eastern Europe to Central Europe could strengthen considerably. […] Also the cold winter weather should continue through February and the Southwest could be hit by the Russian beast from the east. This scenario could extend into deep into March. ‘After the last five much-too-cold winters, this development would be no real surprise and well within the realms of the possible,’ says meteorologist Jung.”

If this forecast (fraught with uncertainty) should pan out out to be true, then it would be a record six colder-than-normal winters in a row for Europe. You just couldn’t drift further away from global warming. Six in a row would be nothing short of spectacular. Such a long, protracted winter as described above would make it one of the worst in 100 years.

But not every meteorologist is convinced that long-term seasonal forecasts are of any value. Swiss meteorologist Jörg Kachelmann at Twitter, for example, scoffs at such prognoses, writing that it’s mainly stuff “from the charlatan department“.

Again we have reiterate that these forecasts are truly speculative, and all the meteorologist point this out. So there really is no need to get pissy about it.

I’m a bit skeptical of the long-term winter forecasts as well, though not as much as Mr. Kachelmann. Large global scale weather patterns can change quickly. For example there’s still lots of uncertainty as to what will happen with the ENSO in the months ahead, and if you can’t predict the ENSO for the next few months, then how can you predict the other global seasonal patterns? Another example is the hurricane season. How often have hurricane season predictions been wrong?

On the other hand, we now have more than 100 years of detailed weather data that now allow us to recognize certain repeating patterns, and so seasonal tendency forecasts are becoming a reality. You can’t just dismiss them offhand.

 

12 responses to “Meteorologists Point To Signs Of Another Upcoming “Nasty Winter For Europe” – Would Be Spectacular Sixth In A Row!”

  1. Joe

    I can’t wait to hear the greenie-types with a real, serious case of apocalypse fetishism to crow on about how they don’t put any stock in the predictive ability of meteorologists.

  2. Chris Frey

    Hello Pierre,

    the upcoming winter will be either a mild one or a cold one – or will change between mild and cold spells. Independant of that: The Chart cited by Dominik Jung is from this address:

    http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/cfsme_cartes.php?ech=6&mode=8&carte=0&run=10

    The CFS model is run every six hours, and the monthly forecasts change wildly between extremely mild to extremely cold. You can check yourself! Each new run gives a complete different result, and you get four different results every day! Its just like throwing the dice, so I consider this completely useless.
    There are other indications far more useful. Joe Bastardi here is on a far better way. A friend of mine, a meteorologist, fully agrees with him.

    Chris Frey

  3. RAJPAL TYAGI

    You are worried about coming winter in Europe. I am facing the heat in India that I never felt in my sixty year. Global change in world is not sudden we new it is coming. Still our attitude has been who the hell care for tomorrow. Now we are facing the crunch and you can not imagine what our children will face.

    1. DirkH

      Where are you in India?

      This is the temperature record of Bangalore.
      http://blog.knowyourclimate.org/2013/changing-local-climate-of-bangalore-1/

      Looks like the 1930ies had hotter max temperatures than today.

      Why was that?

      CO2 was low.

    2. Jimbo

      RAJPAL TYAGI, it’s just the weather and not the climate. India gets heat waves and cold waves with snow. That tells us nothing about global warming or a mini-ice age. The whole point about articles like these is because we were told that Europe should expect warmer winters with less snow due to global warming. The last 5 years makes a mockery of these claims.

      Read and think about it. You are being fooled by these liars and charlatans.
      https://notrickszone.com/2013/04/04/climate-science-humiliated-earlier-model-prognoses-of-warmer-winters-now-todays-laughingstocks/

      1. DirkH

        It should be added that the official prediction of the IPCC climate scientists was always that Global Warming would affect the polar regions much more than the tropics. (If Global Warming were happening, that would be the logical consequence of thermodynamics)

        So if RAJPAL TYAGI is right; that leads to the question why polar regions are not in rapid melting. Global sea ice looks normal and boring.

  4. Harvey

    Bastardi is a political hack.

  5. Dave

    Is Europe still going to have a colder and snowier than usual Winter 2013/2014?

    Thanks

  6. Betsy

    I just returned last week from Bangalore, the “garden” of India. Weather there is considerably milder and less extreme than almost anywhere else in India. That city was in the 70’s, breezy, and dry, but other places farther north (Mumbai and Delhi) were oppressively hot (highs in the low 100’s) and very humid. Bangalore is atypical.

    Also, regarding European weather and global warming, my understanding is that it is global change we are looking at, extremes of both heat and cold, not just higher temps in summer. Thus, bitter cold winters qualify as a signal of the environment’s distress.

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