Spring 2022 | Outlooks and Discussion

[Central Illinois]

Current CPC outlook has a lot of areas with above temps and precip this spring!

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/long_range/seasonal.php?lead=1

Edited February 19, 2022 by Central Illinois

[Tater]

It's still February, and you are already looking at spring? I think we're gonna restrict you to the Tropical section so you can hang out with like-minded individuals and quit giving the rest of us winter weenies panic attacks. 

[Ingyball]

Some of the subseasonal hints are pointing towards an active tornado season this year, I'm especially concerned about the lower OV this year. There's some correlation between above normal rainfall and tornado outbreaks (when the setup favors it). Obviously the MJO has to play nice too. 

[Al_Czervik]

On 2/20/2022 at 6:07 PM, Ingyball said:

Some of the subseasonal hints are pointing towards an active tornado season this year, I'm especially concerned about the lower OV this year. There's some correlation between above normal rainfall and tornado outbreaks (when the setup favors it). Obviously the MJO has to play nice too. 

I don't see it.  Warm ups advertised in Feb has pushed into March.  What is stopping them from being pushed into April or May?  

[Ingyball]

On 2/22/2022 at 4:17 AM, Al_Czervik said:

I don't see it.  Warm ups advertised in Feb has pushed into March.  What is stopping them from being pushed into April or May?  

One thing about severe weather is that it doesn't require it to be warm all the time for it to happen. If anything these extreme swings are perfect for it. We just went from 71 to 11 degrees here in 24 hours. Down in Texas where there was more moisture parts of DFW saw golf ball to 2" hail and now they're dealing with freezing rain. The 2 main things that can quickly kill severe season is a prolonged zonal pattern (which isn't favored right now) and the Gulf being closed due to being below normal (this one cold front probably won't do it.). So in saying that it's completely possible that places like Kentucky and Tennessee could have a tornado outbreak out ahead of a storm system and then have snow fall the next day. 

[so_whats_happening]

Yea I wouldn't necessarily call what we have now cool in any terms. With less then a week until meteorological spring starts we are about cross that speed bump and move on into the warm territory. You can see how the pattern may continue to be the same as we head into early/mid March besides some decent cold fronts which is expected as we round out winter. It looks like the Tropical activity in the Eastern Indian ocean helped out with cooling off waters a little allowing the MJO wave to start to progress more. Should be in phase 4 before the end of the month and progress to phase 6 as we head into mid month. The data is not all that good for beyond phase 4 in March but would suggest overall eastern warmth (not record breaking) to take over as we progress into these phases, if we do indeed get to phase 6 in march there may be some rather warm temps to take hold across the east. We see a warming trend again in the eastern IO so we may potentially loop back around or just setup shop again.

We seem to be having the issue with actually getting the MJO wave to move still. It keeps falling short of becoming a continuous wave and gets held up in an octant for a solid month before moving. With waters still not warming all that much around and east of the dateline we really have to wonder how much this Nina dies off. Look how long it has taken the OLR (downwelling portion, red) to move from August to now and still showing as strong as it has during these events. The subsurface warm punch also is petering out. We may need to watch for the potential of another La Nina situation (weak) to take hold if this continues.

I personally had thought back at the beginning of winter this would have really started to die and become a more warm neutral looks but it really is struggling to do so. The last time we had a 3rd year La Nina was during 1998-2001 as well as mid 70's and then almost but not quite in the mid 50's. La Nina will definitely still have an impact on our weather going into spring. Really am hoping we can continue to stay in an active pattern if we start to dry out it may be one hot one this summer.

[Al_Czervik]

On 2/24/2022 at 12:03 AM, so_whats_happening said:

Yea I wouldn't necessarily call what we have now cool in any terms. With less then a week until meteorological spring starts we are about cross that speed bump and move on into the warm territory. You can see how the pattern may continue to be the same as we head into early/mid March besides some decent cold fronts which is expected as we round out winter. It looks like the Tropical activity in the Eastern Indian ocean helped out with cooling off waters a little allowing the MJO wave to start to progress more. Should be in phase 4 before the end of the month and progress to phase 6 as we head into mid month. The data is not all that good for beyond phase 4 in March but would suggest overall eastern warmth (not record breaking) to take over as we progress into these phases, if we do indeed get to phase 6 in march there may be some rather warm temps to take hold across the east. We see a warming trend again in the eastern IO so we may potentially loop back around or just setup shop again.

We seem to be having the issue with actually getting the MJO wave to move still. It keeps falling short of becoming a continuous wave and gets held up in an octant for a solid month before moving. With waters still not warming all that much around and east of the dateline we really have to wonder how much this Nina dies off. Look how long it has taken the OLR (downwelling portion, red) to move from August to now and still showing as strong as it has during these events. The subsurface warm punch also is petering out. We may need to watch for the potential of another La Nina situation (weak) to take hold if this continues.

I personally had thought back at the beginning of winter this would have really started to die and become a more warm neutral looks but it really is struggling to do so. The last time we had a 3rd year La Nina was during 1998-2001 as well as mid 70's and then almost but not quite in the mid 50's. La Nina will definitely still have an impact on our weather going into spring. Really am hoping we can continue to stay in an active pattern if we start to dry out it may be one hot one this summer.

Hoping this pans out.  Done with the 7 weeks of continuous below normal temps.

[ClicheVortex2014]

No chill from Euro

[ClicheVortex2014]

Region 3.4 is now at the coolest it has been this winter.... -1.1C. Impressive resiliency. Usually ENSO events die in January or February... this one is getting a second wind. That means we should see La Nina patterns last longer into the year than we've seen in a while. Unfortunately, this is also bad news for those along the coast come hurricane season.

Week of March 2:

Region 1+2: -1.3C
Region 3: -1.2C
Region 3.4: -1.1C
Region 4: -0.6C

Peak of La Nina (week of December 15, 2021)

Region 1+2: -1.7C
Region 3: -1.2C
Region 3.4: -1.1C
Region 4: -1C

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/data/indices/wksst9120.for

[so_whats_happening]

Well that was a fun run lol

Scandinavian ridging took place most of the run as well as the ridging holding in the Alaska/ Bering sea at 500mb. That has some real staying power especially with it connecting vertically.

Edited March 8, 2022 by so_whats_happening

[Ingyball]

8 hours ago, ClicheVortex2014 said:

Region 3.4 is now at the coolest it has been this winter.... -1.1C. Impressive resiliency. Usually ENSO events die in January or February... this one is getting a second wind. That means we should see La Nina patterns last longer into the year than we've seen in a while. Unfortunately, this is also bad news for those along the coast come hurricane season.

Week of March 2:

Region 1+2: -1.3C
Region 3: -1.2C
Region 3.4: -1.1C
Region 4: -0.6C

Peak of La Nina (week of December 15, 2021)

Region 1+2: -1.7C
Region 3: -1.2C
Region 3.4: -1.1C
Region 4: -1C

https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/data/indices/wksst9120.for

Very concerning for the central U.S. I'm afraid we may get a drought rivaling 2011. 

[MidwestWX]

3 hours ago, Ingyball said:

Very concerning for the central U.S. I'm afraid we may get a drought rivaling 2011. 

I had a brief discussion about this with a coworker the other week and we agreed it could be a brutal Summer for the region. The implications of the prolonged (or rebound) La Nina will be interesting regardless...
I was concerned going into this Winter that we'd have another dry/weak SWE season like last year. We're not much better than we were last year with limited snow pack across the southern part of Minnesota but one big change from last year was the more active clipper track that provided snow/precip across eastern ND/northern MN and that should help the Spring Fire wx season. 

[MidwestWX]

Here's February climo. You can see the stark gradient in precip anomalies across my neck of the woods but more importantly the amount of dry across half of the conus. 

Edited March 10, 2022 by MidwestWX

[ClicheVortex2014]

So far tornado activity has been following climatology pretty closely. 

[so_whats_happening]

Wow GFS now within 240 hours goes full on split. Impressive progression all lead by just the Alaskan ridging. With 500mb help at the Scandinavian region this then has the potential to go into the Negative NAO regime. This will be an interesting progression for late spring in a La Nina. Beware the phase 2 MJO potential coming up too just so much taking place right now lets see how it goes down. Euro as well.

Just wanted to add you can see how our system off the NE Coast gets some stratospheric influence very cool to see these connections taking shape.

@Poco

[Poco]

@so_whats_happening not just gfs and gefs but euro has been doing it for days now as well 

from the 8 0z

from 10 0z

there are definitely some interesting things to follow right now, interseasonal  periods are fascinating 

 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Poco

[Poco]

 

 

dont have the time to break this all down but it appears that some artic air may finally meander its way down.  We’ve had a record strong vortex fir most of the season that  is now getting split twice in two weeks .  The forecasted split also appears to finally “unlock” some artic air that has been trapped by very strong night jets.

personally  it’s not the best timing for me, I’d rather spring sprung, but can’t deny a signal for possible interesting end to March.  Lots of things pointing at a period a couple weeks from now that could have an effect on our sensible weather here in the northeast. 

Edited March 11, 2022 by Poco

[so_whats_happening]

5 hours ago, Poco said:

 

 

dont have the time to break this all down but it appears that some artic air may finally meander its way down.  We’ve had a record strong vortex fir most of the season that  is now getting split twice in two weeks .  The forecasted split also appears to finally “unlock” some artic air that has been trapped by very strong night jets.

personally  it’s not the best timing for me, I’d rather spring sprung, but can’t deny a signal for possible interesting end to March.  Lots of things pointing at a period a couple weeks from now that could have an effect on our sensible weather here in the northeast. 

Really cool to see that NAM index always seen it never knew where it was from. Shows the intial punch weakened the hell out of the vortex back at the beginning of march which i think was that initial warming from the atlantic wave train giving rise to the strengthening alaskan ridge. 

This may potentially put a damper on severe weather being widespread and more confined to gulf states and maybe far SE US. Will be interesting to see how this evolves. Color me surprised at the progression.

May extend snow threat potential at least into beginning of april if things set up right or just cold rains down this way. Either way good to see the moisture in early spring makes me feel better about drought potential going into summer.

[StretchCT]

Long range battle.  Looking at Detroit area

[Al_Czervik]

On 3/12/2022 at 1:10 PM, StretchCT said:

Long range battle.  Looking at Detroit area

 lived through map 1 all winter, lets hope map 2 verfies.

[ElectricStorm]

Models starting to hint at a possible severe weather event about a week from now. I'm not getting excited yet since it's way out there but it's shown up on the past several runs so it's gonna at least be something to watch. 

[StretchCT]

Long range challenge.  27 in the Berkshires vs 70.  41 in Trenton v 75.  39 in NYC v 72. 30 in BGM vs 67. Mid day temps no less.  GFS looking at 20 below normal.  

[so_whats_happening]

GFS seems to finally be connecting the idea of the persistent Scandinavian Ridging that has been taking place going into a the NAO domain and thus giving us a -NAO. This looks to take hold around midweek next week (23rd/24th area). This will ultimately still allow for a weakness to occur in the eastern US and allow a trough to push down to end the month and maybe into the first week of April? See if this sign continues been waiting to see the models finally grab a hold of this idea.

 

MJO circled back to phase 2 briefly and is back in phase 3 which will translate to the brief cooldown (last week of the month) to maybe a more pronounced cooling taking hold into the upper midwest versus the NE as we round out into April. As we continue into spring though the NAO domain starts to really lose its hold in the east with wave lengths becoming longer which would promote more central US based cooling to occur. This looks like potential for the front range of the rockies to cash in as we move forward. This will be a good thing for much of the plains though as they need the rain so lets hope this verifies. This also will confine most of the severe weather along the gulf coast states as we move forward with brief interludes of the SE getting in on the action.

The Euro not quite as ambitious with the -NAO as the GFS coming up but this has been a thing of the Euro this year to play catch up in this region compared to the GFS, again still very surprising to see this year.

If the atmospheric coupling between 500mb and 10mb has anything to say we may be in for a cool spring with the destruction of the once really strong SPV. Will continue to watch as we move into the weekend to see if the -NAO idea holds and if these connections will translate through time between the layers. I really would watch the last week of the month though for a potential snowfall situation above 40N where this takes place is a guessing game just yet but would favor the midwest more so than the east I feel but we may not escape unscathed.

Again I only want to post to hr 240 beyond is always a toss up. I worry though going into the melting season of the NHEM that we may experience one heck of a melt season for sea ice. I do not like the constant ridging popping up from a pacific born ridge versus an arctic born ridge. The time from April to early June is super important for the melt season and potential retention of sea ice. It would mean rapid melt of snow across much of Canada and aid in the idea of some intense sea ice losses into the Beaufort Sea region.

Edited March 18, 2022 by so_whats_happening

[Al_Czervik]

7 hours ago, so_whats_happening said:

GFS seems to finally be connecting the idea of the persistent Scandinavian Ridging that has been taking place going into a the NAO domain and thus giving us a -NAO. This looks to take hold around midweek next week (23rd/24th area). This will ultimately still allow for a weakness to occur in the eastern US and allow a trough to push down to end the month and maybe into the first week of April? See if this sign continues been waiting to see the models finally grab a hold of this idea.

 

MJO circled back to phase 2 briefly and is back in phase 3 which will translate to the brief cooldown (last week of the month) to maybe a more pronounced cooling taking hold into the upper midwest versus the NE as we round out into April. As we continue into spring though the NAO domain starts to really lose its hold in the east with wave lengths becoming longer which would promote more central US based cooling to occur. This looks like potential for the front range of the rockies to cash in as we move forward. This will be a good thing for much of the plains though as they need the rain so lets hope this verifies. This also will confine most of the severe weather along the gulf coast states as we move forward with brief interludes of the SE getting in on the action.

The Euro not quite as ambitious with the -NAO as the GFS coming up but this has been a thing of the Euro this year to play catch up in this region compared to the GFS, again still very surprising to see this year.

If the atmospheric coupling between 500mb and 10mb has anything to say we may be in for a cool spring with the destruction of the once really strong SPV. Will continue to watch as we move into the weekend to see if the -NAO idea holds and if these connections will translate through time between the layers. I really would watch the last week of the month though for a potential snowfall situation above 40N where this takes place is a guessing game just yet but would favor the midwest more so than the east I feel but we may not escape unscathed.

Again I only want to post to hr 240 beyond is always a toss up. I worry though going into the melting season of the NHEM that we may experience one heck of a melt season for sea ice. I do not like the constant ridging popping up from a pacific born ridge versus an arctic born ridge. The time from April to early June is super important for the melt season and potential retention of sea ice. It would mean rapid melt of snow across much of Canada and aid in the idea of some intense sea ice losses into the Beaufort Sea region.

I was hoping for another normal spring.  Guess the never ending ridge keeps on trucking.

[Snowgeek93]

Does a potentially cooler spring mean overcast and dreary everyday for the great lakes region? Can we get some high pressure systems mixed in with that type of pattern? I just have to ask.

We're not heading into another Spring 2019 scenario are we? 

Edited March 18, 2022 by Snowgeek93