This time of year the jet shifts to our North & a blocking high sets up over CA blocking storms for the summer. What has happened the past few days is that a low has cut-off from the jet to our North & sitting off the CA coast. It is too far away to bring much wind yet, but it's drawing up moist air from the South that has been triggering showers & thunderstorms the past few days.
As the storm slowly drifts towards the coast over the next week it will draw more moisture up & create more showers & thunderstorms each day. It will also bring colder air as it moves closer. Most of this week should be off & on rain showers with temps around 60.
Models have the storm finally coming onshore with steadier rain for next weekend. Hopefully the storm will finally clear out & return summer weather by the following week.
Big start to the ski season in the Southern Hemisphere with resorts in New Zealand opening over a month early with natural snowfall bases. We could use an early start this year. Last Oct. opening I think was over a decade ago. Conditions are continuing to evolve towards El Nino for this upcoming winter. NWS maps show below avg. precip for the Pac NW this winter which would be the opposite of the past 3 winters. This would indicate the southward shift in the storm track over CA normally associated with an El Nino. Looking good!.....BA
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
Winter of 51 - 52?
One thing that I always try to do is not to over-hype anything for fear of being disappointed, both myself & anyone listening. The problem is that as I study the research going into the upcoming winter I keep hearing 1951-52 being thrown around, & then I look at the snowfall history graph on my wall for that year & it was the second biggest snow year since 1880.
In 1952 Over 800” fell over Donner Summit. This is the year that the media loves to grab photos from to try & say that it doesn’t snow as much now, which is dead wrong that was just an insane year. That year almost doubled the seasonal average. You may think you want it to snow that much, but I have a picture here on my wall of July 1952 taken on top of Mount Rose Hwy. where the snow banks are still over 20 ft. high. If we were to have a year like that again where would we put all the snow with the increase population? Biggest year since 1952 was 1983 with around 670”, then 1996 in most recent memory with around 600”. I wasn’t here then but I hear stories that even in King’s Beach the roads were impassible for weeks.
The problem the last 3 winters is that it has been too cold to snow. Not only has the earth been cooling but the Pacific down near the equator where the storms feed has been cold. That is not good for breeding storms to feed the jet, plus it tends to form a big ridge over the East Pacific blocking storms from hitting CA. What we need is some warming of the water in the nino region by the equator to get us from the La Nina of the past 3 winters towards El Nino. That isn’t easy to do when the earth is cooling & sunspots are at 100 year lows in activity. But we may catch a break this winter as the ocean currents & wind patterns are starting to warm the water near the equator while the rest of the Pacific remains cold. What forecasters do is take the current weather patterns & try to match them against previous years to find the most similar year, & then see what followed. Here is a recent quote from a long-range forecaster I love to follow & study, Joe Bastardi.
"Let's for instance take this upcoming winter. In the broad backdrop, '51-'52 stands out as the go-to winter. We had the overall reverse of the PDO (there still can be warm episodes) and a cold AMO that was going back to its warm state, as I suspect the AMO will for another five years (the downturn now is temporary and mainly tropical water based, more or less a reaction to what has happened, much like the El Nino developing is), but we were coming off a solar max, not min. The cumulative buildup of bigger areas of cold that take place when there is less sunspot activity is most pronounced as the upturn is occurring, and that puts us close to the '76-'77 winter in the cycle. However, the overall temp of the Earth was as cold as the double cold PDO, cold AMO could have it in the mid-70s, and we are just off the warmest period now. The listing of this is not to draw a conclusion, but to inform the reader, just like I try to do in any aspect, of the fact that what is happening now may mean a lot to what happens later."
So 76-77 was a really dry winter here, but we were reversing from a cold period to warm. Right now we are reversing from warm period to cold. I.E. 1952. So lets not get too excited here in May, but this is something to watch over the summer. As long as we continue to warm the water towards an El Nino state you can only argue that it has to be wetter next winter than the past 3. Let's keep our fingers crossed. BA
In 1952 Over 800” fell over Donner Summit. This is the year that the media loves to grab photos from to try & say that it doesn’t snow as much now, which is dead wrong that was just an insane year. That year almost doubled the seasonal average. You may think you want it to snow that much, but I have a picture here on my wall of July 1952 taken on top of Mount Rose Hwy. where the snow banks are still over 20 ft. high. If we were to have a year like that again where would we put all the snow with the increase population? Biggest year since 1952 was 1983 with around 670”, then 1996 in most recent memory with around 600”. I wasn’t here then but I hear stories that even in King’s Beach the roads were impassible for weeks.
The problem the last 3 winters is that it has been too cold to snow. Not only has the earth been cooling but the Pacific down near the equator where the storms feed has been cold. That is not good for breeding storms to feed the jet, plus it tends to form a big ridge over the East Pacific blocking storms from hitting CA. What we need is some warming of the water in the nino region by the equator to get us from the La Nina of the past 3 winters towards El Nino. That isn’t easy to do when the earth is cooling & sunspots are at 100 year lows in activity. But we may catch a break this winter as the ocean currents & wind patterns are starting to warm the water near the equator while the rest of the Pacific remains cold. What forecasters do is take the current weather patterns & try to match them against previous years to find the most similar year, & then see what followed. Here is a recent quote from a long-range forecaster I love to follow & study, Joe Bastardi.
"Let's for instance take this upcoming winter. In the broad backdrop, '51-'52 stands out as the go-to winter. We had the overall reverse of the PDO (there still can be warm episodes) and a cold AMO that was going back to its warm state, as I suspect the AMO will for another five years (the downturn now is temporary and mainly tropical water based, more or less a reaction to what has happened, much like the El Nino developing is), but we were coming off a solar max, not min. The cumulative buildup of bigger areas of cold that take place when there is less sunspot activity is most pronounced as the upturn is occurring, and that puts us close to the '76-'77 winter in the cycle. However, the overall temp of the Earth was as cold as the double cold PDO, cold AMO could have it in the mid-70s, and we are just off the warmest period now. The listing of this is not to draw a conclusion, but to inform the reader, just like I try to do in any aspect, of the fact that what is happening now may mean a lot to what happens later."
So 76-77 was a really dry winter here, but we were reversing from a cold period to warm. Right now we are reversing from warm period to cold. I.E. 1952. So lets not get too excited here in May, but this is something to watch over the summer. As long as we continue to warm the water towards an El Nino state you can only argue that it has to be wetter next winter than the past 3. Let's keep our fingers crossed. BA
Monday, May 11, 2009
I'm Back...
Sorry about the long delay in posting. I was out of town the past 3 weeks, which is why you had a bunch of storms of course. The season is now almost transitioned into summer with the ridge in charge & dry conditions until Sept. Over the summer there is lots of studying to do of the upcoming pattern for next winter.
Latest figures for precipitation came out on the 7th. Tahoe's snowpack is at 52% of average. April was a very dry month after a wet month in March, plus we got a lot of rain the first week of May that washed the snow away.
Total precip for April came in at 42% of normal but that number is high because they included the storm the first 4 days of May. Truckee reported only 16% of average in April with 96% of average already in May with that first storm. The only month above average this water year starting in Sept. was March, with that 6-8 foot snowstorm in the beginning of the month. Nov. & Dec. were over 80%, Jan. was 20%, March was 105%. Total on the water year beginning in Sept. is 82% of normal precip in Tahoe.
With the cold storms in December most of the resorts still saw above average snowfall on top of the mountains above 7000 ft. We still may get another rain storm before all is said & done in May which would put the month above average for precip. Back Country is in good shape above 8000 ft. with the storm last week.
Now we need to watch the ocean temps. Right now we are in neutral territory as far as the Nino's are concerned coming down out of 3 years of La Nina, which is to blame to for frequent ridges on the West Coast & below average precip the last 3 years. Coming Top-Down from La Nina to El Nino usually means above average precip in CA as the storm track aims further down the coast. Right now the outlook shows a mild el nino on tap for next season, which could mean we finally go above average. Some analoging models to the current pattern show us matching up with the winter of 1950 which was a big year. Stay tuned as more data continues to come in.....
The sun is still asleep, this is getting interesting, research it. BA
Latest figures for precipitation came out on the 7th. Tahoe's snowpack is at 52% of average. April was a very dry month after a wet month in March, plus we got a lot of rain the first week of May that washed the snow away.
Total precip for April came in at 42% of normal but that number is high because they included the storm the first 4 days of May. Truckee reported only 16% of average in April with 96% of average already in May with that first storm. The only month above average this water year starting in Sept. was March, with that 6-8 foot snowstorm in the beginning of the month. Nov. & Dec. were over 80%, Jan. was 20%, March was 105%. Total on the water year beginning in Sept. is 82% of normal precip in Tahoe.
With the cold storms in December most of the resorts still saw above average snowfall on top of the mountains above 7000 ft. We still may get another rain storm before all is said & done in May which would put the month above average for precip. Back Country is in good shape above 8000 ft. with the storm last week.
Now we need to watch the ocean temps. Right now we are in neutral territory as far as the Nino's are concerned coming down out of 3 years of La Nina, which is to blame to for frequent ridges on the West Coast & below average precip the last 3 years. Coming Top-Down from La Nina to El Nino usually means above average precip in CA as the storm track aims further down the coast. Right now the outlook shows a mild el nino on tap for next season, which could mean we finally go above average. Some analoging models to the current pattern show us matching up with the winter of 1950 which was a big year. Stay tuned as more data continues to come in.....
The sun is still asleep, this is getting interesting, research it. BA
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