Weak El Niño predicted for ski season

[Admin]

Courtesy Dr. Steenburgh:
http://wasatchweatherweenies.blogspot.c ... pdate.html

Discuss away.

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[jtran10]

"The presence of a moderate or strong El Nino stacks the deck for a drier than average winter in the northwest and a wetter than average winter in the southwest"

I like that (even though he goes on to say it's a borderline event)

[Tony Crocker]

Steenburgh does good work from what I've seen. His closing line seems appropriate:

In other words, I haven't a clue what is going to happen this winter.

El Nino looked like it might be of some significance for 2 months (MEI +.903 MAY/JUN and +1.139 JUN/JUL) http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/people/kla ... table.html .
But it weakened by half for JUL/AUG to +.579. Past snow history shows that El Nino effects are less consistent than La Nina effects, and many people such as Larry Schick think El Nino has to be fairly strong before it affects North America's snow in any meaningful way.

[GJWallace]

well, I've been hearing reports of snow fall as early as last week on other forums and emails i receive from some kite-boarders that i met while i was attempting the sport, snow fall in areas such as the coquihalla and even on this site i saw a post saying revelstoke got some in the past couple days. In my experience when an el nino is forecasted the beging of the season tends to get alot of snow followed by a drought for a month or two then a huge dump in remaining months expected to have snow, take the 2010 Olympics year for example i was hiking the north shore mountains a couple days before Halloween that year and continued to do so until the mountains opened two weeks early on november 14th or so.

Last year I read an article about the volcano eruption in iceland that closed all those airports, the article went on to say things that in the past that major volcanic eruptions can trigger colder winters in the years following and that is what can be expected from this most recent event, starting last year and continuing on for another two years after this one (12/13 season, 13/14 season, and 14/15 season) the 13/14 being the coldest winter since the 70's. i forget the exact details of what exactly causes the cold snap but i did notice this summer was colder and very inconsistent in temp. but i do know from studying sustainable resource management that when the earth was still in the early stages volcanic gasses helped form our atmosphere. I really could go on (kinda want to) but i know many arnt intrested in this but if youd like to know i could explain why so many volcanoes that used to be the worlds most active have suddenly fallen dormant. and how all that can relate to global warming, and thats were ill end or else ill keep rambling.

[Tony Crocker]

the article went on to say things that in the past that major volcanic eruptions can trigger colder winters in the years following

The Iceland volcano of 2010 was not in that league.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volcanic_Explosivity_Index
The above is a logarithmic scale like Richter for earthquakes. You have to get up to 6 (Krakatoa, Pinatubo) for a discernable climate impact. Tambora (which I saw in cloud on my recent dive trip to Indonesia) was the only 7 of the past 3,000 years. Mt. St. Helens was a 5 and the Iceland volcano of 2010 was a 4.

In my experience when an el nino is forecasted the beging of the season tends to get a lot of snow followed by a drought for a month or two then a huge dump in remaining months expected to have snow

Not nearly enough data to draw conclusions like this. There is an impression that El Nino hits late season more than early season, certainly true in California during the 2 huge El Ninos in 1983 and 1998. Even if this part is true, it is not that likely to apply to moderate/weak El Ninos.

i did notice this summer was colder and very inconsistent in temp.

Localism to an extreme degree. No question the PNW had a cool spring/summer. I'm sure most of us have read plenty that North America as a whole set numerous temperature records on the upside. 2012 is likely to be the overall warmest year for North America in the ~100+ years of detail temperature records.

how all that can relate to global warming

The 2012 North America temperatures are already fueling that issue. I do not know whether other areas in the world have been warm enough for 2012 to break out above the previous world overall highs of 1998, 2005 and 2010 (roughly equivalent).

(12/13 season, 13/14 season, and 14/15 season) the 13/14 being the coldest winter since the 70's.

This is inline with Joe Bastardi's forecast. He believes that due to Pacific Decadal Oscillation and solar influences overall world temps will cool to the 1970's level by 2030. As with the AGW advocates, Bastardi's predictions should be measured vs. reality. He said going into the cold 2008 winter with the ongoing cooling trend that 2007 would remain the maximum arctic ice melt and that summer arctic ice extent would start to increase. But 2012 arctic ice melt is more than 2007. I'll bet we see a lot of publicity about this when the final 2012 arctic ice minimum is official within the next few weeks.

[Tony Crocker]

As predicted... http://news.yahoo.com/dramatic-arctic-i ... 24385.html

I didn't think my timing would be that good though. Here's the site that tracks arctic ice which you can look up anytime: http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/

[berkshireskier]

In contrast to a record Artic sea ice melt this past summer, see link below to a very cold winter in the Antarctic.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor ... er-record/

Short-term weather patterns around the globe are variable.

[Tony Crocker]

Antarctic sea ice extent (winter or summer) is largely due to the temperatures of the current season as most of it is first year ice and melts in summer. FYI this also applies to Arctic winter ice, which was very high during the cold 2007-08 winter. Summer arctic sea ice effects accumulate over time because it's easier for first year ice to melt than for thicker ice that has been there a long time. So even if the Arctic starts to cool instead of warm it will take several years of that to bring the Arctic summer ice level back to the baseline (which is only 1979 because that's when satellite measurements started).

IMHO both sides of the debate have unanswered questions:
1) Why is the Antarctic overall not warming (though parts of it like the Peninsula are)?
2) If the overall global warming of the 1980's and 1990's is slowing down or reversing, why does the summer arctic ice melt continue to set records?

I wonder if these two phenomena are in some unknown way related and offsetting each other?

berkshireskier's source also references this tidbit, perhaps more relevant to skiers:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor ... -snowfall/
No surprise to me because the lack of trend in snowfall in my data is what caused me to start digging deeper on the issue of climate change in the first place.

I do not know whether other areas in the world have been warm enough for 2012 to break out above the previous world overall highs of 1998, 2005 and 2010 (roughly equivalent).

It appears not. http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2012/8

The combined global land and ocean average surface temperature for January–August 2012 was the ninth warmest such period on record, at 0.56°C (1.01°F) above the 20th century average.

2005 and 2010 were 0.64°C (1.01°F) above the 20th century average with 1998 almost as high.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/2011/13

We're still on the decade+ plateau of temperatures, not increasing further but not decreasing like Bastardi and the solar cycle advocates predict either.

[Tony Crocker]

The MEI index http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/people/kla ... table.html has fallen from +1.139 in JUN/JUL to +.271 in AUG/SEP. That means the El Nino is so weak as to not be a meaningful weather predictor anymore.

[rfarren]

In other words: some days it will snow, some days will be sunny, some days it will rain (at least on the east coast).