El Nino is Coming Back

[grouseking]

Well get ready for an interesting hiking winter folks, El Nino is making a comeback . I remember back in 1998 when we had a strong El Nino there was an absence of cold air in southern New England...maybe in the mtns too but I can't remember. It will be interesting to see what happens this year as New England's climate is tough to predict in an El Nino year.

grouseking

 

[RGF1]

maybe one of our meterologist friends will chime in. but from what i understand it is but one factor that influnces our weather . I do not recall right off hand what they are . but it has a effect as does other things . I knoiw how much cold air from well the artic and sibieria comes hear and where it fo does the things that stear the jet stream ect ,. But I will leave that to them .

We have had a number of warmer and low snow years in new England .
So I expect more of the same out in Co we had a above average smow year . and it is already snowing there in a big way . You already need full winter gear to go above 11,000 or so . and there is noit much of a long therm out look .

 

[grouseking]

I would definitely like to hear a meteorologists take...

One big storm that occurred during that year was the weeklong ice storm. In normal years, it would have been cold enough for snow. That year it was either just warm enough for rain at all levels except for the shallow ground layer in many locations north of southern new england. It kind of depended on elevation too, I believe places over 1000 ft to like 3000 ft got hit the hardest. That explains why Zealand Notch got hit so hard with ice that storm.

I lived in southern NH that year and remembered storm after storm passing over the 40N 70W benchmark (a good place for storms to travel to bury most of New England in heavy snow) and we would get rain and temps in the 40s. One storm started as snow and then the rain snow line flew inland all the way to Berlin and Whitefield in a matter of hours. We got like 2.5 inches of liquid (at least 25 inches of snow with a 10 to 1 ratio) ...and the storm traveled along the bench mark. It could have been the grand daddy of winter storms! (We did get the day off from school because forecasters were wrong!) It was a weird winter to say the least.

Then La Nina occurred the next winter (the cooling of the Pacific) and I remember that places all the way to the Canadian border didn't have snow on the ground till after Christmas.

My take on it....temperatures will probably average warmer than normal like they are predicting. If we get the normal amount of storms for the year, I'd think that the higher elevations would still get a normal amount of snow because of elevation. But there will probably be a lot of freeze thaws (rock hard ice) similiar to this past winter making for delightful travel on the trails. This is thanks to the variability that El Nino winters bring New England. Again I'd like to hear what a real meteorologist has to say about the subject.

grouseking

 

[DougPaul]

I remember back in 1998 when we had a strong El Nino there was an absence of cold air in southern New England...maybe in the mtns too but I can't remember.

IIRC, there tends to be less snow in the NE when El Nino is around...

Doug

 

[Quietman]

Here's some input from another closet weather nut.
From the following data, I'm not sold on a direct impact in the Northeast.

EL Nino/La Nina From NOAA's site

Winter...Ocean....Peterborough, NH Snow
92-93......Normal.........123"
93-94...El nino(weak)...109"
94-95...El nino(weak)....36"
95-96.....Normal..........167"
96-97.....Normal..........106"
97-98...El nino(strong)...78"(only 18" in Feb/March)
98-99.....La nina...........55"
99-00.....Normal...........63"
00-01........"...............120"(50" in March )
01-02........"................53"
02-03........"...............125"
03-04........"................73"(32" in Dec.)
04-05........"...............112"
05-06........".................64"(12" in Feb , 1" in March )
06-07.....El Nino?...........?

Last year really looked like it was off to a great start with 80" on Mt Washington in October. Everyone was predicting a good winter, then it just fizzled away. Trail running the last week in Feb. in sneakers was very depressing.

 

[grouseking]

Yeah there was even a weak El Nino back in 02-03 and remember how very cold it was? I think the mtns got all their snow at once...the last couple months of winter...when the temps moderated a little. I would definitely say that the results are pretty inconclusive as to what is going to happen. But chances are, there will be extremes, occurring more often, and we'll see how much snow cranks out.

grouseking

 

[NewHampshire]

FWIW the Farmers Almanac is predicting above average snow and colder than normal temps.....c'monnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn winter .

Brian

 

[weatherman]

Not a meteorologist, but a weather geek...
My take on this is that a weak El Nino means very little, while a strong one means warm and wet, and La Nina typically means dry (and maybe warm). Warm and wet can mean beaucoup de neige in the colder areas, though rain near us.
Most importantly, you can win money over time saying any year will be warmer than normal, just because of trends over the past 30 years. And there are a zillion ingredients in any winter, so no single condition has more than a small effect on the overall snowfall and temps.

Weatherman

 

[Quietman]

Another new long range forecast just came out. I really like Accuweather's Joe Bastardi and he is calling for normal to below normal temps, and normal snowfall, with possibly a snowy Feb and March.

Joe Bastardi Winter Forecast