Cold event setups in atmospheric circulation patterns are aligning. Two days ago I brought to your attention that there was a strong downspike in the Arctic Oscillation Index and that the North Atlantic Oscillation Index was also negative. See The Arctic Oscillation Index goes strongly negative
Yesterday, Senior AccuWeather meteorologist Joe Bastardi let loose with this stunning prediction on the AccuWeather premium web site via Brett Anderson’s Global warming blog:
What is facing the major population centers of the northern hemisphere is unlike anything that we have seen since the global warming debate got to the absurd level it is now, which essentially has been there is no doubt about all this. For cold of a variety not seen in over 25 years in a large scale is about to engulf the major energy consuming areas of the northern Hemisphere. The first 15 days of the opening of the New Year will be the coldest, population weighted, north of 30 north world wide in over 25 years in my opinion.
The Climate Prediction Center discussion for their forecast also concurs with both of the above:
THE AO INDEX WHICH RECENTLY HAS BEEN VERY STRONGLY NEGATIVE IS FORECAST TO INCREASE SLIGHTLY IN VALUE BUT REMAIN STRONGLY NEGATIVE THROUGH DAY 14. TODAYS BLEND CHART INDICATES BELOW NORMAL HEIGHTS ACROSS ROUGHLY THE SOUTHEASTERN TWO-THIRDS OF THE CONUS, AND ABOVE NORMAL HEIGHTS OVER THE NORTHWESTERN THIRD OF THE CONUS, CONSISTENT WITH A STRONGLY NEGATIVE AO.
Here are two of the CPC forecast maps for the days covered by Bastardi’s forecast. It is fairly typical to see an above average temperature in the west when we get a cold deep jet stream in the east:
I was going to include some Met Office forecasts here but after trying to find something useful at their web site and failing to find anything, I gave up looking.
If you live in these areas: bundle up, stock up. Get ready.
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Re: Caleb (14:21:42) :
Can’t say as I recall a drought here in Colorado in those years. But I sure remember this:
http://www.super70s.com/Super70s/Tech/Nature/Disasters/Floods/76July31-Big_Thompson.asp
For first-hand accounts of the floods, read below the NOAA story. This was a popular canyon for tourists, and I hiked there weekends as a college student. We would ford the Big Thompson near the mouth to get to the north side, where we’d climb.
@Tonyb
You know, you could combine the three proposals, the ice rink, the prison and the coal power plant and produce carbonite (Star Wars). A lot of useful applications in one basket.
That is not correct. Or you have a selective memory. You had a cold winter last year, in 2008. Record-Low Temperatures Kill One More in Bulgaria
Sorry, wrong link to the cold spell in Bulgaria in 2008.
I just realized… I’ve become my own definition (from younger days) of an “old guy”… I’m not only talking about weather, but recalling specific years.
Ouch.
Patrick Davis.
I agree the weather is not unusual, it’s just that it has happened a month or so earlier than what you would normally expect. I’m told the 1851 fires were the worst in recorded history: there were no fallen power lines to start that one. Also, many are started naturally by lightning strike, and others by humans, accidental or deliberate. Many houses surrounded by vegetation, survived February’s bushfires, others in cleared areas were destroyed. Clearing vegetation around your house, while certainly a wise move, is no guarantee your property is protected. Again, some who ignored the rules and cleared bush around their houses still had property destroyed. And yes, I knew you meant 2009.
Roger Carr,
Yes, a lot of rain has fallen in the Murray Darling basin, hopefully there will be good follow up rains. Weather the water makes it all the way downstream depends on how many farmers want to use their full water allocation. Rain in the desert is fine but nobody grows crops there. Melbourne’s catchments did have good rains in October, but a few more heavy downpours would not go astray. If we get good rains over the next two years I’d say the drought would be broken. We’ll see!!!!
Patrick,
The simple answer to water supply problems is to recycle: no need for new dams and catchments. Unfortunately the population is against drinking recycled water. In Melbourne, a large part of suburbia is supplied with water drawn from contaminated sources, and treated to potable standard. What you don’t know doesn’t hurt you.
Amicus curiae
Again clearing of vegetation is no guarantee against bushfires. But better regulations in regard to building material, allotment sizes and location of houses would be a good start.
Les Francis,
The desal plant is budgeted to cost $5.7billion, to build and operate for 30 years, supplying 150Gl of water per year. I’m not sure what river has more water than it can handle, but the issue of water across state boundaries is a contentious one. Piping water from one area to another is only robbing Peter to pay Paul, and you still have the issue of storage prior to transfer.
Tty
I’m all for intelligent informed debate but I’ll answer your question anyway.
As for drought, it pays to read to whole statement, in particular the sixth paragraph.
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/drought/drought.shtml
As for the last 40,000 years, I wouldn’t have a clue. Obviously you go back a little further than me. Suffice to say it will always burn, the question is will it be worse than last year.
Peter
For heavens sake read the original post and lighten up- it was a joke on the last couple of days of the old year.
Yes of course I have been to the met office many times on official business as I did on a professional basis when they were in Bracknell.
tonyb
Check these forecasts for AO for January 2010, almost -6 and we all thought that -4 was a record low during December 2009. Joe Bastardi is right on with his forecast.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/daily_ao_index/ao_index_mrf.shtml
Here in sub-tropical Brisbane it has been a cool (for Brisbane, not for Minnesota) Xmas. For the last couple of weeks we seem to have had heavy rain every day.
A few years ago we were desperate for water. Heavy water restrictions were in place. (No washing cars or peeing allowed.)
vukcevic (08:58:04) : Thanks Vuk!. After your kind response I´ve been thinking what a good proxy fish catches are, fishes are better thermometers..and they do not lie as humans do. Along SA west coasts, when anchovy reappears, surfaces, it is because the cold, South-North-West, Humbold´s current surfaces too and El Nino takes vacations.
Mike Bryant (04:59:15) : “Too bad that most of our scientists and government agencies already have complete understanding of climate from the surface of the sun all the way to the central core of our dear earth.”
Which are both at millions of degrees, according to Big Algor.
They know it all. If you don’t believe it, just ask ’em:
“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.” –NOAA
All hail, great and powerful NOAA, awesome in thy self-proclaimed might and wisdom! May thine excellence draw the gaze of all the gods, that they may marvel at thy claims of all-knowingness and honor thee with their full attention…
“Unfortunately the population is against drinking recycled water. In Melbourne, a large part of suburbia is supplied with water drawn from contaminated sources, and treated to potable standard. What you don’t know doesn’t hurt you.”
ShaneofMelbourne
All water is recycled. There isn’t any which hasn’t been everywhere during the course of the planet’s history. Which is why there’s a common saying that when you drink a glass of water in London, the water has already passed through several pairs of kidneys, so it must be pretty pure…
The UK Met Office have lost the plot.
Their forecasts of seasonal weather have been rubbish for the last 3 years and even the 3 day forecast is so inaccurate that if you take the opposite of what they say, your more likely to be right.
The MOD have withdrawn funding and It’s time the place was shut down to save the tax payer some money. Science and politics are a recipe for disaster.
The Jewish people as a whole will become its own Messiah. It will attain world dominion by the dissolution of other races, by the abolition of frontiers, the annihilation of monarchy and by the establishment of a world republic in which the Jews will everywhere exercise the privilege of citizenship.
In this New World Order the children of Israel will furnish all the leaders without encountering opposition. The Governments of the different peoples forming the world republic will fall without difficulty into the hands of the Jews. It will then be possible for the Jewish rulers to abolish private property and everywhere to make use of the resources of the state. Thus will the promise of the Talmud be fulfilled, in which is said that when the Messianic time is come, the Jews will have all the property of the whole world in their hands.”
— Baruch Levy, Letter to Karl Marx, ‘La Revue de Paris’, p.574, June 1, 1928
REPLY: OK this being historical, I’ll leave it, but let’s steer away from any further religious discussions please – Anthony
Peter Hearnden (15:15:47) : “I live nearby and have visited Exeter and the Met O. many, many times….The Met Office is a popular addition to the Exeter area and economy….”
Yes, I agree, Peter. Your proposal for converting the Exeter Met Office into the All-Britain Humorless Twit Museum and Waxworks is a splendid and timely one. I shall pass it along, as you suggest, to the local authorities.
Dodgy
All water is recycled………I can’t disagree with that. And I’m sure London’s water is as good as it gets, I did work for Thames Water here for a number of years!!!!
In Melbourne the Eastern Treatment Plant discharges 370ML of water daily into the sea. This water, with additional treatment, could easily be reintroduced into the reticulation system. The new Desal plant about 30km from the ETP discharge point, will take sea water and treat it for consumption at a far greater cost than upgrading the ETP.
A few years ago, the population of the Queensland town of Toowoomba voted against the recycling of treated water for consumption despite a dire shortage of water. It appears to be the Aussie mindset.
I would hazard a guess and say that using treated recycled water for human consumption is political suicide.
[learn to post links, it’s not really that hard ~ ctm]
Mihail (17:23:42) :
Anthony and mods, I may be wrong, but that post I am referring to sounds an awful lot like skinhead propaganda. Your site, so leave the post up if you wish, but I couldn’t find an actual reference that wasn’t along the lines of what I linked too, which I sure hope you delete if you leave this post up. Sorry, don’t mean to pound on the religion drum, I know you dislike it. 🙁
New postings from Joe Bastardi
“The colder it gets, the warmer these people try to claim it is”.
and a direct remark to his European Audience:
“Freedom, that sounds like a revolting idea.
Somebody let the telegraph know a cold winter was forecast for Europe from over three months out. I would appreciate that”.
http://www.accuweather.com/ukie/bastardi-europe-blog.asp?partner=rss
ShaneOfMelbourne (17:59:31) :
Dodgy
“All water is recycled………I can’t disagree with that. And I’m sure London’s water is as good as it gets, I did work for Thames Water here for a number of years!!!!”
Yes, you can see the Thames Waterworks in action from space her:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/NaturalHazards/view.php?id=18169
Zoikes! Scrub link from my comment please. I only posted it so you could see why it might help to delete the comment @ur momisugly Mihail (17:23:42) :
Europe : GFS shows just very bad weather for next thursday (7th of january)
http://www.meteociel.fr/modeles/gfse_cartes.php?&ech=180&mode=1
How many “weathers” equal a “climate?”
Kadaka notes:
But directly heating a metal pressurized propane tank, with fire?
Not something you’d want to do in the summer but when the outside temperature is -55 C (which was recorded that winter in Hinton) a fire under the propane tank is the only way to go. I agree that a nice electrical heater around the tank to get it up to a balmy -30 C or so would be a safer alternative, but I don’t think we had any power then and there was no wood stove in the cabin. Water was supplied by a water truck that would show up a couple of times a week and the water was stored as ice as the interior temperature of the cabin was below freezing much of the time.
I’ve talked to other people who have spent winters in the north during the 1950’s and 1960’s and they also had to light fires under their propane tanks. I’ve never heard of one exploding and the fire is actually quite an inefficient way of heating the tank.
After writing the first note I suddenly figured out why the cold never seemed to bother me when I was younger — brown fat. One of the ways of preserving brown fat into adulthood is to have infants grow up in a very cold environment. I certainly experienced that at the age of 2. Brown fat burns fat to produce heat via short-circuited mitochondria and I remember one of my physiology profs critiquing my experiment where we estimated basal metabolic rates by looking at how fast we individually used up a fixed amount of O2. My metabolic rate was 3x that of the class average and that was a time in my life that I could eat anything and would have trouble maintaining my weight. I argued that I had done the experiment properly and my metabolic rate was that hight. I also felt quite warm in the winters back then.
Unfortunately we don’t have any easy way of increasing brown fat in adulthood; either you have kept it as a child or you haven’t. This area has been researched extensively by drug companies as it would be a very profitable weight loss drug; all one would have to do to lose weight would be to walk in below zero weather lightly dressed. With the current global cooling combined with punitive carbon taxes perhaps we’ll see more and more people retain their brown fat although they’ll probably be taxed on their markedly increased CO2 production when compared with their brown-fat deprived neighbors.