Can’t you just see this scrolling across your TV during an EAS alert?”…. If this had been an actual El Niño, you would have been instructed on where to complain to your nearest modeler turned forecaster….” I wonder what kind of graphical icon TWC will come up with for an El Niño Watch? – Anthony
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Feb. 5, 2009
Contact: Linda Joy
301 713-0622, ext. 127
NOAA Unveils New Alert System for La Niña and El Niño
La Niña Likely to Continue into Spring
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center today issued the first La Niña advisory under its new El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Alert System. Forecasters expect La Niña to influence weather patterns across the United States during the remainder of the winter and into the early spring.
Defined as cooler than normal sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, La Niña impacts the weather globally. La Niña’s opposite is El Niño, or warmer than normal ocean temperatures. These changes in ocean temperatures alter the tropical wind and rainfall patterns with far reaching implications.
“The typical weather patterns associated with La Niña and El Niño affect many industries including agriculture, transportation, energy, shipping and construction,” said Michael S. Halpert, deputy director of the Climate Prediction Center. “The ENSO Alert System will succinctly inform industry, government agencies, academia and the public about the onset and status of La Niña and El Niño. This system will also help decision makers plan for the potential effects presented by these conditions.”
La Niña conditions have been present since late December, but it is too early to say exactly how strong the event will be and precisely how long it will last. However, for the next few months La Niña is expected to bring milder and drier than average conditions to the southeastern and southwestern states. It is also expected to bring wetter-than-average conditions to the Ohio and Tennessee valleys, and cooler than average temperatures to the Pacific Northwest.
The new ENSO alert system includes La Niña and El Niño watches and advisories which the Climate Prediction Center will issue when specific conditions exist.
- La Niña or El Niño Watch: conditions in the equatorial Pacific are favorable for the development of La Niña or El Niño conditions in the next three months.
- La Niña or El Niño Advisory: La Niña or El Niño conditions have developed and are expected to continue.
These watches and advisories are now part of the ENSO Diagnostic Discussion, which is issued by the Climate Prediction Center on the Thursday falling between the 5th and 11th of every month. It is available online at http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory.
NOAA understands and predicts changes in the Earth’s environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and conserves and manages our coastal and marine resources.
– 30 –
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The January, 2009 Nino 3.4 numbers are out and at -0.99C, this would be considered a mild La Nina event so far.
Here is the Nino 3.4 index for the past 8 months.
Jun 2008 -0.32
Jul 2008 +0.11
Aug 2008 +0.14
Sep 2008 -0.20
Oct 2008 -0.26
Nov 2008 -0.22
Dec 2008 -0.73
Jan 2009 -0.99
What a stupifyingly worthless system – this is a joke – right?
Tell me I’m having a bad dream
Off tpoic in a way but after congress passes this stimulus ,with all the global warming pork four hundred million to be exact ,there will be not stop global warming adds on t v.What’s going to happen is with in within 2 years there will be a news flash .DUE TO PRESIDENT OBAMA ‘S BILLS BEING PASSED GLOBAL WARMING HAS BEEN STOPPED !!Thank you Mr. Obama.But what will really be happened is we will in a cold cycly with low solar activity and a blank sun.Is it ok to turn the heat back to seventy again or do we have to get appproval from congress??
La nina means cooler summertime for us in Lima City, South America, it means also rains to the east side of the andes and predominantly in the southern andes, rains over Bolivia and Brasil and drought for the Argentinian “pampa” and, of course drought in the USA. But this time it seems that we will have several “la Nina” in a row, as used to be in the LIA:
As Geologist Miguel Gonzales says in his paper:
“Abstract We present a climatic reconstruction of Holocene lacustrine episodes in the Salinas del Bebedero basin (Argentina), based on geological and diatom information.
Morphological, sedimentological and diatom evidence between 11600 ± 140 yr BP and 325 ± 95 yr BP, allowed us to interpret the paleoenvironments of the basin. Episodes of high energy (sandy levels) are linked to large inflow of meltwater through the Desaguadero River, related to development of glaciers on the Andes. This inflow is characterized by peaks of relative abundance of the brackish water diatom Cyclotella choctawatcheeana Prasad. The values of C. choctawatcheeana decrease in deposits of low energy (clay levels), where it co-dominates with oligohalobous Fragilaria and Epithemia spp.
To the last two peaks of large inflow of meltwater, radiocarbon dates corrected to sidereal ages, are AD 1280/1420 and AD 1443/1656. These ages agree with two cold episodes clearly recorded in dendrological studies from the Patagonian Andes and were correlated to the Little Ice Age. Thus, older Holocene episodes of large inflow of water to the basin were correlated with the Neoglacial Advances defined by Mercer (1976) for the Andes.”
Link: http://www.springerlink.com/content/m11m129238u61484/
In spanish: http://linux0.unsl.edu.ar/~geo/p-geoambiental/libro-salinas.htm
Mary Hinge (02:09:04)
This is the NOAA’s definition Historical Pacific warm (red) and cold (blue) episodes based on a threshold of +/-0.5 oCfor the Oceanic Nino Index (ONI) [3 month running mean of ERSST.v3b SST anomalies in the Nino 3.4 region (5N-5S, 120-170W)], calculated with respect to the 1971-2000 base period. For historical purposes El Niño and La Niña episodes are defined when the threshold is met for a minimum of 5 consecutive over-lapping seasons.
What this says to me is For historical purposes El Niño and La Niña episodes are defined when the threshold is met for a minimum of 5 consecutive over-lapping seasons, in other words it would not be considered as a La Nina/El Nino episode in the historic records if It does not meet those conditions.
However it doesn’t mean that La Nina/El Nino conditions cannot prevail over a shorter period. We are currently in a La Nina but whether it will be recorded as a La Nina episode in the historic records depends on it fore filling the above criteria.
Were are those screaming about that upcoming El nino that was coming? It was just last week mind you. We were shown absolute proof that 3.4 was weakening and that we were headed to warming fast. Unavoidable even. They were telling us how wrong NOAA’s prediction of La Nina conditions through spring were. I remember their arrogant posts..
Maybe you guys didn’t know what you were talking about? Maybe the rest of us already long figured that out.
Hey Daffy, does this not sound like:
Did not!
Did too!
Did not!
Did too!
Did not!
Wondering if negative PDO along with La Nina conditions throws new wrinkles into expected behavior. It isn’t like we’ve been thru this since PDO was characterized.
E.M SMITH
“So, what am I supposed to do when it’s La Nina? Bomb shelter? Helmut? Gas Mask? Chardonnay? Brei? Business Casual? Enquiring minds want to know!!!”
Who’s Helmut and why do you need him in the shelter?
There was also an El-Shifto watch issued this morning in the Journal Science. Apparently melting ice “may” (it’s always there) shift the earth’s rotation and drown us all:
http://www.canada.com/melt+shift+earth+rotation/1260349/story.html
I’m at a loss for words. My toddler can’t even tell whoppers this big.
Two weeks ago,
I thought the La Nina was dwindling.
Now I’m not so sure.
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/PSB/EPS/SST/climo&hot.html
“NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center today issued the first La Niña advisory under its new El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Alert System.”
—This was not the first La Niña advisory for 2009, but the first “under its new . . . Alert System.” A fine point to be sure, but a proper distinction. We’ve known about, and have been preparing for, La Niña spring conditions for months now.
NOAA weather wonks have already met (months ago) with the OES leadership of California counties likely to be impacted by La Niña/El Niño weather events. Search and Rescue (SAR) coordinators are updated regularly and are given warnings and watches should any weather event develop. My county’s OES got a briefing last November of what to expect this spring from a “mild La Niña”. This story is just about a new alert system. It does not mean there hasn’t been a working warning system in the past.
Also . . . Mike McMillan (00:55:01): “Did we learn nothing from Katrina ? I blame George W Bush for not having this warning system in place.”
Need some historical perspective here, Mike. The effects of Katrina were anticipated at least a year in advance. The actual event included several warnings a day from the NHC. As the prediction of the time and location of Katrina’s landfall tightened up in the days before, FEMA DMAT teams (Disaster Medical Assistance Teams) moved into New Orleans. The problem with the preparedness for Katrina fell squarely on Ray Nagin’s shoulders for not implementing the disaster response plan that had been on his shelf for many months. All the details about this are available, but off topic. Let’s not drag the former president into 2009 weather events. It’s irrelevant.
A bit OT, but anyway related to the accumulation of heat in the oceans: is it me, or both the arctic and antarctic are not feeling really well now?
http://www.nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png
http://www.nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images//daily_images/S_timeseries.png
I know temperature anomalies have been high in some parts of the arctic, but anyway… This + the increase in global temperatures… I wouldn’t like to be baby ice…
Bob D: I suspect you are correct. They are reporting La Nina conditions, not a “full-fledged” La Nina event. It’s appears to be similar to providing thunderstorm and tornado watches (conditions are favorable) in advance of warnings (severe weather is occurring). They’re simply giving advanced notice.
The present NINO3.4 SST anomaly for the week centered on Wednesday Jan 28 is -0.94 deg C, which is a slight rise in SST from the prior week. The rest of the January monthly SST anomaly graphs are here:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/02/january-2009-sst-anomaly-update.html
NINO3.4 SST anomalies have been lower than the threshold of -0.5 deg C for 8 weeks now. How long they will stay down there is anyone’s guess.
Terry46
The carbonists would like to get credit for “saving the world” from global worming but if CO2 keeps rising like a moonshot, they’ll never get away with claiming they stopped the problem.
China’s coal based electrification project guarantees the CO2 rise will continue to be steep. If the temperature doesn’t follow suit, their hypothesis is disproved and no amount of denial and spin can overcome that.
After reading about Gavingate at CA, I absolutely felt compelled to leave a tip to Steve McIntyre’s site. In fact it’s a good time to leave a tip to any of these websites. Guess I’m just feeling generous today.
I urge others to do the same.
I understand La Nina is more prevalent during negative (cooler) phases of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). Since the PDO went negative recently then we should expect many more La Nina events over the next two to three decades and a generally cooler global climate. Shouldn’t the NOAA be informing the public and legislators about that likelihood of many more La Nina events during the next 20 to 30 years? Maybe they have, but I haven’t seen any article in the mainstream media discussing the shift to a negative PDO. The evidence is clear: warm PDO = more warming El Nino events and cool PDO = more cooling La Nina events. Combined with a less energetic Solar Cycle 24 we might be in for some downright frigid years or decades. And the AGW alarmists think CO2 drives “climate change” – how idiotic.
No one has to worry about the kooks going out there and claiming they saved the world with their activism.
– CO2 will continue to rise
– Temps will most likely fall
– there’s no way they’re gonna weasle out of this.
I think a major class action lawsuit ought to be prepared to sue these charlatans for widespread fraud.
Retroproxy,
You’re expecting a little too much from the “scientists” at NOAA.
You’re right. They ought to be warning of increased frequency of La Ninas.
But behold – that would be going against their ideology, and would actually entail science and performing public service on behalf of the citizens. God forbid!
Retroproxy: You wrote, “I understand La Nina is more prevalent during negative (cooler) phases of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO)…”
Or did the PDO turn negative because of the La Nina conditions?
In “ENSO-Forced Variability of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation”, Newman et al state in the conclusions, “The PDO is dependent upon ENSO on all timescales.” Refer to:
http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/people/gilbert.p.compo/Newmanetal2003.pdf
There really is little difference between the NINO3.4 and the PDO when you look at the monthly data over long terms.
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2008/06/chicken-or-egg-pdo-or-enso.html
And since the PDO calculations were originally formulated to bring the ENSO signal from the North Pacific SST data, I’d have to agree that the PDO is a function of ENSO and not vice versa.
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2008/06/common-misunderstanding-about-pdo.html
E.M.Smith (03:03:26) :
“[…] So, what am I supposed to do when it’s La Nina? Bomb shelter? Helmut? Gas Mask? Chardonnay? Brei? Business Casual? Enquiring minds want to know!!!”
La Nina: Start barbequeing
El Nino: Stop barbequeing
If Mary is right(an occasion I have yet to determine whether following cause or mere correlation), maybe NOAA isn’t authoritative anyway. IRI certainly isn’t.
Somewhat OT but Anthony have you seen Dr Gray’s Docs on Models etc on ICECAP?
IMO the best explanation of why the models are failing. Also, some discussion of the AQUOS (SP?) satellite data (where has that disappeared to?). Like to see these papers discussed here.
That should be “why the models…”
It’s been very dry and warm here this winter (So Cal Desert) Not a flake of snow below 3000 feet and little rain. I work in a large industrial plant and have seen no broken pipes or other freeze damage. It’s T-Shirt weather today already above 68F before 10:AM
I wonder (aloud) if Fema will use this prediction tool to raise threat levels thereby allowing my flood insurance rates to be hiked when El Ninyo pokes his head in.
I live in the High Desert above 2400 Ft elevation with no flood history and FEMA raised the classification of our flood zone this year adding $600+ to my insurance on one acre that’s worth less than $80K.
A pox on all FEMAs!