There Is Nothing New About The El Nino Modoki
Guest post by Bob Tisdale
The press release…
http://media-newswire.com/release_1094000.html
…for the Hye-Mi Kim, et al (2009) paper “Impact of Shifting Patterns of Pacific Ocean Warming on North AtlanticTropical Cyclones”…
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/325/5936/77
…includes the quote from Peter Webster, one of the authors of the paper, “’Normally, El Nino results in diminished hurricanes in the Atlantic, but this NEW TYPE is resulting in a greater number of hurricanes with greater frequency and more potential to make landfall,’ said Peter Webster, professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences.” (Caps added for emphasis.)
The press release continues, “That’s because this NEW TYPE of El Nino, known as EL NINO MODOKI (from the Japanese meaning “similar, but different”), forms in the Central Pacific, rather than the Eastern Pacific as the typical El Nino event does. Warming in the Central Pacific is associated with a higher storm frequency and a greater potential for making landfall along the Gulf coast and the coast of Central America.” (Caps added for emphasis.)
Hye-Mi Kim et al (2009) references (Their Reference 10) the Ashok et al (2007) paper “El Nino Modoki and its Possible Teleconnection.”
https://www.jamstec.go.jp/frcgc/research/d1/iod/publications/modoki-ashok.pdf
Ashok et al introduce a new index to document the occurrence of an El Nino Modoki event. They write, “Based on the EOF2 pattern presented in Figure 2b and the PC2 time series shown in Figure 3, we derive an El Niño Modoki index (EMI). Because of the unique tripolar nature of the SSTA, the index is defined as follows:
“EMI= [SSTA]A-0.5*[SSTA]B-0.5*[SSTA]C (1)
“The square bracket in Equation (1) represents the area-averaged SSTA over each of the regions A (165E-140W, 10S-10N), B (110W-70W, 15S-5N), and C (125E-145E, 10S-20N), respectively.”
The areas of the western, central, and eastern tropical Pacific included in the equation are illustrated in Figure 1.
http://i25.tinypic.com/ek3r44.png
Figure 1
Figure 2 is a short-term (1979 to 2008) times-series graph of the El Nino Modoki Index, using the calculation from Ashok et al. I’ve also standardized the data. Ashok et al define a typical El Nino Modoki event as, “We call an El Nino Modoki event ‘typical’ when its amplitude of the index is equal to or greater than 0.7α, where α is the seasonal standard deviation.” I’ve also highlighted 0.7 on Figure 2.
http://i31.tinypic.com/70dxsy.png
Figure 2
Figure 3 is a longer-term (1900 to 2008) times-series graph of the El Nino Modoki Index. As you will note, El Nino Modoki events as determined by the El Nino Modoki Index have occurred over the entire term of the data. There is nothing NEW about El Nino Modoki events.
http://i28.tinypic.com/2cyo57p.png
Figure 3
SOURCE
HADISST data is available through the KNMI Climate Explorer website:
http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere
davidsmith1: El Nino Modoki Index averaged for August through October:
http://i29.tinypic.com/1zxplpl.png
Looks like there was a run around 1900, too, but the tropical Pacific SST data is questionable before 1914. Then there were another pair around 1920. What I enjoy is that the 1986/87 El Nino shows up, but the second part (1987/88) of it doesn’t. Apparently, the warm spot moved east, which they have a tendency to do as the El Nino progresses. (IMO, the 1986/87/88 El Nino was the second of the Super El Ninos in the 20th century, not 1982/83, since El Chichon suppressed most of the heat transport of the earlier one.)
You’ll soon discover there are a few differences between the Hye-Mi Kim et al Figure S-2 and this one.
I’ll also work up a couple of NINO3.4 and El Nino Modoki comparison graphs tomorrow morning.
Regards
Bob Tisdale
“(IMO, the 1986/87/88 El Nino was the second of the Super El Ninos in the 20th century, not 1982/83, since El Chichon suppressed most of the heat transport of the earlier one.)”
Bob:
Are you talking impacts or relative strength? The ’82-’83 El Nino was huge in terms of anomalies in the Equatorial Pacific. Even the ’72-’73 event had quite a peak: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/quick_look/sst34.gif
“IMO, the 1986/87/88 El Nino was the second of the Super El Ninos in the 20th century, not 1982/83, since El Chichon suppressed most of the heat transport of the earlier one.”
Bob:
Are you saying the impacts from the ’86-87 El Nino were greater than the ’82-83 event? Looking at 3.4 anomalies, the latter was a huge event. The ’72-’73 El Nino was also quite a show: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/quick_look/sst34.gif
Thanks, Bob.
It looks like ’65, ’66, ’67, ’77,’ 86, ’90, ’91, ’94, ’02, and ’04 were Modoki seasons.
For comparison, Kim lists ’69, ’91, ’94, ’02 and ’04 as CPW seasons. Pretty big mismatch.
Related to Kim’s Figure S2, I easily replicated the Nino 3 values in the Figure but was way off on the Nino 4 values. I still haven’t identified the reasons for the differences.
Come back to first principles then – to the physics and chemistry involved (supposedly!) in GISS’s work.
What size the “cubes” How are they set around the world by latitude, elevation, and longitude (?) and by ocean and ground? Are the “cubes” the same size in x, y, and z? _ if Not, how are changes vertically handled in temperature, pressure, winds, water and humidity and clouds? What are modeled for mountains, seas, and high “flat” elevations? What about slowly changing elevations – such as Rockies CO to Western Mississippi? How are peninsula’s like FL and Thailand (?) and islands like New Zealand and Greenland and New Guinea handled? How is Antarctica handled? The Arctic?
Are jet streams produced (internal to the model) by the math as a function of the math itself, or are they artificially simulated by the equations or are they ignored altogether?
We understand “clouds” are a single, fixed, simple factor: A single assumed value. If this is correct, does that value change with time, humidity, “rainfall” predictions output or “drought” or higher temperatures or do the “climate modelers” simply keep one cloud value forever across 100 years or 200 years of processing?
Are clouds changing with elevation? With the different time steps, do “clouds” get changed by the output of previous steps, and what exactly IS fed back from step n to step n+1, n+2 , n+3 etc?
What is the physics in each “cube” – there ARE hundreds (if not thousands) or engineers and doctors and even scientists capable of understanding each equation, and easily understanding the “physics and chemistry” of each interaction inside each cube. WHAT do the models assume iis going on in the “cube”? and who has checked or audited or peer-reviewed (by name!) these steps.
Who has checked the computer coding in each “cube” to verify that what the equations are supposed to be is what what the computer is calculating?
First I thought of making a snide comment about some super massive el nino but then I thought about it. Given that the ocean current model is failing it must be a very exciting time to be in this particular field of expertise. With the addition of new tech toys and models to be made well… i guess it depends on what spin you want to put on the data. Sadly, I bet we know about as much about our oceans secret life then we do about the surface of Mars. 🙂
Karl: You asked about my 1986/87/88 El Nino comment, “Are you talking impacts or relative strength?” and Are you saying the impacts from the ‘86-87 El Nino were greater than the ‘82-83 event?”
The peak NINO3.4 SST anomalies for the 1982/83 and 1997/98 El Ninos were similar, but the El Chichon eruption impacted the heat transport of the 1982/83 El Nino, so it was a non-Nino. That is, the 1982/83 El Nino had little to no measurable impact on global temperature. The peak NINO3.4 SST anomalies of the 1982/83 and 1997/98 El Nino events were substantially higher than the 1986/87/88 El Nino, but the 1986/87/88 El Nino lasted through the entire year of 1987, plus the ramp up in 1986 and transition to La Nina in 1988. The 1986/87/88 El Nino was so strong it caused a noticeable upward step change in global temperature, like the 1997/98 El Nino. The heat transport of the 1986/87/88 and 1997/98 El Nino events can be seen in the RSS MSU TLT Time-Latitude Plots and Time-Series graphs I provided here:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/06/rss-msu-tlt-time-latitude-plots.html
So to answer the first of your questions above, I was talking about global impacts and about relative strength and duration.
David Smith: You wrote, “Related to Kim’s Figure S2, I easily replicated the Nino 3 values in the Figure but was way off on the Nino 4 values. I still haven’t identified the reasons for the differences.”
I also had some problems trying to duplicate the Hye-Mi Kim et al Figure S2. Standardizing the data helped. Keep in mind that they described how they determined EPW and CPW events as, “EPW, CPW, and Eastern Pacific cooling (EPC) events are defined as follows: Niño 3 (fig. S1) warming greater than 1 standard deviation (SD), for EPW; Niño 3 or Niño 3.4 cooler than 1 SD, for EPC; and for CPW, Niño 4 warming exceeding 1 SD, while Niño 3 stays below this range. The results are shown in fig. S2.” So there is another qualifier other than NINO4 having a higher SST anomaly than NINO3 for the CPW event.
For those interested in short-term (~30 year) comparisons of scaled monthly NINO3.4 SST anomalies and El Nino Modoki Index data, I’ve just posted them.
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2009/07/comparison-of-el-nino-modoki-index-and.html
I remember reading about 2 years ago (I don’t know where) that El Ninos in negative PDOs are more centered in the Pacific and during positive PDOs they are centered right on the South America coast. This does cause a different pattern in North America; positive PDO El Ninos are very warm and wet in the eastern US, and negative PDO El Ninos are cooler but still wet(think snowy winters in the late 70s). So it makes sense that it might affect where hurricanes go. But this is all natural and has nothing to do with AGW.
Karl: Thanks for bringing up the 1972/73 El Nino. The post I’m working on would not have been complete without it. The post is about the similarities between significant El Nino events and the lesser ones that follow (aftereffects?). Here’s a comparison of the 1972/73, 1986/87/88, and 1997/98 El Nino events:
http://i27.tinypic.com/2wdpyt4.png
And here’s the same data smoothed with 25-month filters:
http://i32.tinypic.com/2eulhuh.png
The shapes of the curves of the NINO3.4 SST anomalies that followed those big three events are strikingly similar.
Thanks again for the reminder.
It is only a matter of time before the AGW crowd discovers that oceanic oscillations dictate our weather pattern variations, therefore it is incumbent on us to reduce the amount of pollution draining into our oceans. That means that anything that makes it into our oceans should be regulated. CO2, animal waste, irrigation drainage, etc. Protect the oceans. Can you imagine the list of banned substances? This is a case easier to make than greenhouse gasses. Actually, they would have done a better job of this AGW to have focused on ocean pollution sources. Instead of monitoring the skies for greenhouse gasses, they should be monitoring the oceans for pollution.
This Georgia Tech group is constantly torturing data “in creative ways” trying to prove the case that global warming is increasing hurricane numbers and increasing hurricane intensity.
Is the Modoki index values available somewhere?
I plotted the Nino 4 and Nino 3 region values against US landfalling hurricanes in various different ways and there is just no “different type of El Nino” relationship to landfalling hurricanes whatsoever. I haven’t tried this novel Modoki method however.
Bill Illis: You asked, “Is the Modoki index values available somewhere?”
I had to create my own using the SST anomalies for the areas listed in Ashok et al and the simple formula they included.
Regards
You can take “modoki” as an equivalent of a postfix “-oid”.
Modoki not only means “similar but different”, but also conveys a nuance of “somewhat inferior to the original.”
They need to be looking in the Atlantic too. The stored ocean heat from the run of high solar cycles will come out into the lower tropospheric temperatures. I predict north Atlantic Ocean Heat Content will plummet following this el nino.
Josh Willis will be wondering if his Atlantic Argo floats have thrown another wobbly, and it’ll probably get ‘adjusted’ away in the processing of the raw ARGO data.
“El Nino Modoki and its Possible Teleconnection.”
“Teleconnection”??
Please, water is heavy. It doesnt get teleported from the Pacific to the Atlantic. The heat coming out of the surface of the Atlantic is the stored heat from below the surface of the Atlantic.