Seasonal forecasts are iffy. Right now, however, there are strengthening indicators showing winter brutality in the pipeline for Europe rushing at us like an express train.
Don’t let the current relatively benign autumn conditions fool you. I’ve been following all of this over the past couple of weeks, and as a result decided last Friday to get the winter tires installed! The trend has crystalized and solidified.
It doesn’t look good if you’re hoping for a mild euro winter start – like the one we really had last year.
German weather and climate site wobleibtdieglobaleerwaermung here provides some background on what is in store in the latest analysis titled:
Winter is coming early to Europe – polar vortex splits!”
Right off the bat the site provides the latest ECMWF analysis of the geopotential 150 hPa (approx. 14 km altitude, lower stratosphere) from 28 October 2016, writing:
The polar vortex for this time of the year is unusually powerful and has expanded far to the south. It has two partial vortices over Siberia and Northern Canada (polar vortex split), whereby the polar vortex over Siberia is stronger. A powerful cold trough of the partial vortex over Siberia (Rossby waves) is positioned over North and Eastern Europe and feeds cold polar air downward. Source: www.geo.fu-berlin.de/met/winterdiagnostics.html.”
The German site also points to the QBO, quasi-biennal ossillation in September 2016 has flipped in favor of powerful easterly winds:
In the easterly wind phase (negative QBO) the Arctic polar vortex can collapse (negative AO), and then with high probability lead to a cold winter.”
Bastardi: “vicious” conditions for mid November
Meanwhile 40-year veteran meteorologist Joe Bastardi further solidifies the early winter European trend with his addictive weekly Saturday Summary at WeatherBELL Analytics site here:
At the 12:45 mark Joe presents a chart of the forecast model 11-16 days out for the northern hemisphere (above), calling the Russian-European situation “vicious”, exclaiming that he is “in awe of that”. Note the vast swath of cold extending all across Siberia, Russia, China, India, Europe and beyond.
Keep in the back of your minds, however, that the atmosphere is chaotic, and thus surprises are always in store. There’s no 100% certainty in these forecasts. Still, the probabilities for colder than normal conditions over the weeks ahead are strong – likely much stronger now than Clinton winning the presidency.
[…] zum WMO-Klimamittel 1981-2010 überzogen: Der Frühwinter ist Anfang November 2016 da! Quelle: Weather Models Now Agreeing: Early WINTER BRUTALITY For Europe/Asia, With “Vicious” […]
So who to believe? The map shows a very warm area in central Canada. The Weather Network (Canada) shows a massive cold blob over most of central NA during the same week. Deer hunting opens 14 Nov. My question is am I going to enjoy the season or freeze my ass off? Just saying
So while everyone seems to be looking intently at the ice cubes in the water of the polar region, the land surrounding it is set for freezing weather.
Tell me again what is the good indicator of climate trends — Land or sea?
Also from https://www.aer.com/science-research/climate-weather/arctic-oscillation
Land or sea?
Or both?
I have been unable to find Joes Saturday summary since they changed the site. Give us a direct link please
Stephen Richards – click on News/Press under the drop down menu and you’ll find the Saturday summary there if you scroll down the page.
Here you go, both the Saturday Summary and the very useful Daily Summary (M – F) can be found here:
http://www.weatherbell.com/premium/
All part of the service!
“and as a result decided last Friday to get the winter tires installed! ”
General rule in Northern Germany is “O to O” – “O”stern – Eastern to “O”ctober – so get the summer tires on on Eastern and get’em off in October. So, sounds like a perfectly normal onset of cold temperatures.
[…] Farben) mit Abweichungen zum WMO-Klimamittel 1981-2010 überzogen: Der Frühwinter ist da! Quelle: Weather Models Now Agreeing: Early WINTER BRUTALITY For Europe/Asia, With “Vicious” […]
why has it been so warm in the arctic this fall temperatures are up to 16 degrees Celsius up there is there any explanation for that.
meant 16 degrees Celsius warmer than normal
Why has it been so warm in the arctic region recently it has been up to 16 degrees Celsius warmer than normal up there is there an explanation for the warmth.
Low pressure West of Alaska pumping huge amounts of warm air North ?
Situation a week ago:
Wind Map: http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/gfse_cartes.php?ech=6&code=0&mode=14&heure=0&jour=25&mois=10&annee=2016&archive=1&carte=1
Pressure Map: http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/gfse_cartes.php?ech=6&code=0&mode=0&heure=0&jour=25&mois=10&annee=2016&archive=1&carte=1
The warm from the North Atlantic blob is being sucked up through Bering Strait, sea ice in the Chukchi Sea and the East Siberia Sea is struggling for now.
Once that warmth dissipates, the sea ice will grow rapidly…. but all that energy will be gone. !
I think winter up north could be rather nasty this year.
If we look at the SST for the Arctic we see that the Barents, Kara Sea area is still quite warm as is the Chukchi Sea.
https://s19.postimg.org/6phc9zunn/Oct31_SST.png
The Barents/Kara Sea region sits right under the remnants of the El Nino warming that’s been hanging about over northern Europe/Russia for ages
(I’ve only got the Sept world UAH world temps map, but its pretty obvious)
https://s19.postimg.org/60zpvelmb/SEPTEMBER_2016.png
And as Jan points out, a big low that was sitting West of Alaska pulled the warm from the north Atlantic blob up through Bering Strait.
Hi Pierre,
You put up a post on 30th Oct about irregularities in Swiss temperature data but appear to have taken it down. Is there a problem?