Blogs

If it’s October, it must be time for my annual blog post detailing NOAA’s forecast for the upcoming winter. And as always seems to be the case (well not in 2015), we’re still trying to figure out what will happen across the tropical Pacific. Here I look ahead to provide some insight as to what is most likely to occur during the upcoming winter with regards to both precipitation and temperature. Standard reminder: probabilities are not certainties Before discussing the outlooks, I do want to remind readers again that these forecasts are probabilities (% chance) for below, near, or above-average climate outcomes with the maps showing only the most likely outcome (1). Because the probabil…   Read article

The task of a climate forecaster is to see the forest, and not get hung up on the individual trees. Especially that extra tall one over there, with the gnarl that looks like a face, and the low branches that would be so easy to climb, and… uh, right. My point is that we try to look beyond shorter-term weather to see longer-term monthly and seasonal patterns. After all, a particular winter can have several colder-than-average days and still be warmer than average overall. Which brings me to the current situation in the tropical Pacific! The October ENSO forecast says La Niña conditions are favored during the fall and winter 2017-18, but at press time the ocean-atmosphere system didn’t…   Read article

This year, especially this last quarter, has been a tough one on the weather and climate front. With that said, one silver lining of a rough 2017 has been the general retreat of drought on a national scale. This spring, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, the fraction of the contiguous United States in drought dropped below 10 percent for the first time since 2010. However, with that said, since then, a severe drought emerged quickly in the Northern Plains this summer. As droughts go, this was a “flash drought”—rapid-onset, regional drought, driven by combination of factors, typically during the summer. The early impacts of this drought episode were covered here on Climat…   Read article

You may be thinking “There are even more things that forecasters look at when making seasonal forecasts?” or “Haven’t you already written about those other things, multiple times?” And the answer to both of those questions is yes. But what if I told you that there is another mysterious thing that, at least for seasonal temperature outlooks, gives forecasters a better idea of what will happen than predictions of ENSO or the Madden Julian Oscillation, or the Arctic Oscillation or the North Atlantic Oscillation or the Pacific Decadal Oscillation or…I think you get the point (1). And it’s much simpler than all of those. It’s called the trend. Cool, another vaguely science sounding term. W…   Read article

The climate of the islands of Hawaii and the Pacific is often characterized by iconic scenes of warm, sandy beaches, blue skies, and swaying palm trees.  However, these scenes can be dramatically transformed when sea levels become anomalously high or low, wave action increases due to nearby storms, and drought or heavy rains impact local food supplies.  In other words, there can be climate trouble even in paradise. Most regions of the United States fall within major land areas, and their weather and climate are well observed by ground-based stations. However, the tropical Pacific spans thousands of miles on end without land, and this geography makes it difficult to collect weath…   Read article