Guest post by Steven Goddard
Photo above from: NY Daily News: Record Snowfall in New York
Now that we have reached the end of the meteorological winter (December-February,) Rutgers University Global Snow Lab numbers (1967-2010) show that the just completed decade (2001-2010) had the snowiest Northern Hemisphere winters on record. The just completed winter was also the second snowiest on record, exceeded only by 1978. Average winter snow extent during the past decade was greater than 45,500,000 km2, beating out the 1960s by about 70,000 km2, and beating out the 1990s by nearly 1,000,000 km2. The bar chart below shows average winter snow extent for each decade going back to the late 1960s.
Here are a few interesting facts.
- Average winter snow extent has increased since the 1990s, by nearly the area of Texas and California combined.
- Three of the four snowiest winters in the Rutgers record occurred during the last decade – the top four winters are (in order) 1978, 2010, 2008, 2003
- The third week of February, 2010 had the second highest weekly extent (52,170,000 m2) out of the 2,229 week record
The bar graph below shows winter data for each year in the Rutgers database, color coded by decade. The yellow line shows the mean winter snow extent through the period. Note that the past decade only had two winters below 45 million km2. The 1990s had seven winters below the 45 million km2, the 1980s had five winters below 45 million km2, and the 1970s had four winters below 45 million km2. This indicates that the past decade not only had the most snowfall, but it also had the most consistently high snowfall, year over year.
It appears that AGW claims of the demise of snowfall have been exaggerated. And so far things are not looking very good for the climate model predictions of declining snowfall in the 21st century.
Many regions of the Northern Hemisphere have seen record snowfall this winter, including Washington D.C, Moscow, China, and Korea. Dr. Hansen’s office at Columbia University has seen record snowfall, and Al Gore has ineptly described the record snow :
“Just as it’s important not to miss the forest for the trees, neither should we miss the climate for the snowstorm,”
A decade long record across the entire Northern Hemisphere is not appropriately described as a “snowstorm.”
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A C Osborn (07:59:58) :
And tell us exactly how many Sunspots there will be at noon on the 11th March 2010?
Which noon? New York time? California time? Tokyo time? …
My best estimate at Greenwich Mean Time noon would be a sunspot number of 30. Check back with us when you verified this.
A C Osborn (08:03:48) :
So you also know the Exact age of the Sun as well, my, my, it must be a time travelling machine you use.
No let me guess you Calculated it!
We measure the Earth’s age to be 4.54 billion years and we estimate that the Sun is about 50 million years older than that [although some people disagree and believe the Sun is younger than the Earth by three days, what do you think?]
Steve Goddard (08:09:13) :
“In one chapter, he describes an impromptu experiment in which he showed how the O-rings in the shuttle’s rocket boosters could have failed due to cold temperatures on the morning of the launch.
And he used an English Dictionary as a primary tool, right?
Feynman was good at communicating science in plain English, without having to resort to “(mathematical) assertions [Steve Goddard (08:04:44)]”, but his primary tool was Mathematics.
Steve,
More heat=more moisture=more snow in winter (until it warms enough that the snow will be rain instead. This year, we saw El Nino heat plus a negative AO, so what else could we get but more snow further south.
January & February seeing record heat in the troposphere. So how does this all fit in your scenario? What exactly do you think you’re proving by making your “snowiest” assertion…as it sure CAN’T be that things are getting colder…since they are not.
Timeline:
Leif Svalgaard (11:45:24) :
kadaka (13:21:30): Statement shown false in real world. “Computer vs reality. Computer loses.” Validity of solar calculations not questioned.
Leif Svalgaard (14:02:19) : [Summarized with bracketed notes]
kadaka (15:26:33): Original statement still false in real world, now for more reasons. Validity of solar calculations still not questioned. Question is raised, do you want me to think solar calculations are as sloppy as bridge load ones?
Leif Svalgaard (16:23:15) :
Leif Svalgaard (16:34:12) :
kadaka (00:14:54) : Original statement still real-world false. Validity of solar calculations still not questioned. Question raised, why are you still bothering to try to prop up the original statement? Statement made, continuing to insist that less-precise bridge load calculations are as precise as accepted-as-more-precise solar calculations may lead to the downgrading of personal opinion as to the precision of solar calculations.
Leif Svalgaard (06:33:10) :
Where we are at: Original statement still real-world false. Validity of solar calculations still not questioned (subject to change depending on further arguing).
Why are you still arguing? Ah heck, what are you still arguing?
Leif,
Mathematics is a two edged sword. Applied properly it yields all kinds of important information. Applied improperly it is GIGO. One of the most common mistakes in science is when people jump into detailed math or statistics based on faulty assumptions. It looks impressive, but is often worse than useless.
Leif Svalgaard (08:16:35) :
Finally
“We measure the Earth’s age to be 4.54 billion years and we estimate that the Sun is about 50 million years older than that”
ESTIMATE.
NOT FACT A THEN?
Leif Svalgaard (08:16:35) :
We measure the Earth’s age to be 4.54 billion years and we estimate that the Sun is about 50 million years older than that [although some people disagree and believe the Sun is younger than the Earth by three days, what do you think?]
I think Wikipedia says the difference is 30 million years, not 50, the Sun formed about 4.57 billion years ago. If you are certain it is 50 million then for the sake of humanity please edit Wikipedia at the relevant articles, here is another one. Don’t forget to provide references citing the correct age.
I wonder if climategate smoke and mirrors has covered the stealthy approach of what Professor Vladimir Paar is predicting, a 70,000 year ice age?
What is the data for the ENTIRE potential snow season? You’re only showing December – February.
From IPCC AR4 WG1 Technical summary:
Snow cover has decreased in most regions, especially
in spring. Northern Hemisphere snow cover observed by
satellite over the 1966 to 2005 period decreased in every
month except November and December, with a stepwise
drop of 5% in the annual mean in the late 1980s (see
Figure TS.12).
“Steve Goddard (08:04:44) :
After 270 comments and two days, no one has disputed my (mathematical) assertion that the past decade had the greatest winter snow extents in the Rutgers record. ”
I re-ran F and t testing on the basis “winter” = periods 12,01,02 with the following results
1 2 3 4
66-76 77-87 88-98 99-2010
SD 2051037.523 3208573.615 1495908.297 1916983.291
Mean 45259371 45366337.09 44621390.58 45370340.72
Tally 30 33 33 35
1 to 2 1 to 3 1 to 4
Delta S 672453.1088 456109.106 495197.0944
t 0.159 1.399 0.224
F 2.447241361 1.879910915 1.144749749
Required t 2.0 Req’d F 1.8408
In this case I have ensured that each sample only contains whole “winters” to avoid an upside risk of a false positive.
So yes the mean of snow extent is at a maximum in the latest decade but this does not indicate a movement in the mean of the process. However 77-87 and 87-98 were more variable than 66-76 but 99-2010 is not
“It follows logically that we can’t be at a record decadal high, without having increased from any and all decades in the past”
Well “any and all” is a bit sweeping….:-) statistically rather than logically it is possible for a record to be set without it indicating that the process involved (northern hemisphere “winter” snow generation) has increased its average output.
In this case it appears that “winter” snow extent became more variable for two decades around the same average output and has now stabilised.
Hypothesis that needs testing: A negative feedback mechanism has been triggered to an increased variability in “winter” (dec to feb) snow output, howsever caused….
There you go science in action………:-) Thermageddon still postponed by high school math….
“simon D (14:55:40) :
What is the data for the ENTIRE potential snow season? You’re only showing December – February.
From IPCC AR4 WG1 Technical summary:
Snow cover has decreased in most regions, especially
in spring. Northern Hemisphere snow cover observed by
satellite over the 1966 to 2005 period decreased in every
month except November and December, with a stepwise
drop of 5% in the annual mean in the late 1980s (see
Figure TS.12).”
The data set in play http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/files/moncov.nhland.txt
shows no significant change in mean snow cover at the 95% confidence level in any of the following scenarios: whole year(01-12), early winter (11,12,01) winter (12,01,02) early spring/late autumn (02,03,09,10) between 1966 and 2010. It does indicate increased winter(12,01,02) variability that occured between 1977 and 1987 diminished between 1988 and 1998 and was undetectable in 1999-2010.
simon D,
Far be it for me to question the irreproachable accuracy of the iPCC, but you might want to think about the difference between summer and winter.
Winter extent is defined by snow falling at low latitudes. Summer extent is defined by snow melting at high latitudes. The mechanisms are unrelated, so it doesn’t make a lot of sense to average them together in a trend.
The maximum always occurs in the winter. That is when snow falls. So if you want to measure snowfall patterns – do you do it in the summer, or in the winter?
http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/images/nhland_season1.gif
simon D (14:55:40)
Ummm … well … Stephen Goddard clearly identified the source of his data. I used it to graph the “ENTIRE potential snow season” here.
Read the thread much?
I’ve already posted a link to a complete variation.
If you need it larger or the data, ask. No stats, signal processing.
kadaka (10:25:24) :
Why are you still arguing? Ah heck, what are you still arguing?
You are arguing. I buried the horse a long time ago. Bridges also have a ‘military max loading’ [marked on maps used by tank commanders in the European Theater. You exceed that and the bridge fails [in my time in the Royal Danish Army a half-century ago, I have seen that happen on maneuvers in Germany]. This is a load without safety margin. Here I’m not arguing, I’m telling you. But if you are comfortable with our solar calculations, perhaps the cadaver can go back under ground.
Steve Goddard (10:58:33) :
Mathematics is a two edged sword. Applied properly it yields all kinds of important information. Applied improperly it is GIGO.
Mathematics cannot be applied incorrectly. You can apply it to garbage, but that is not the fault of Mathematics, but of you.
An not applying Mathematics at all is just eyeballing, and doesn’t quite cut it.
A C Osborn (11:16:56) :
ESTIMATE.
NOT FACT A THEN?
Fact is that the Earth is somewhere older than 4.49 Gyr and the Sun is 4.565 Gyr. The age of the Earth is more uncertain that that of the Sun, partly because of the Moon. Measurements of the age of Moon cluster around 4.51 Gyr. Both for the Earth and the Moon the uncertainty is of the order of 0.05 Gyr, so it is hard to tell any better than that.
kadaka (11:40:22) :
I think Wikipedia says the difference is 30 million years
It does not. Take the uncertainties into account as I just explained above.
I don’t understand why you guys keep arguing about bridge load limits. Calvin and Hobbes spelled it out long ago:
Leif,
“There are only 10 kinds of people in the world. Those who understand binary and those who don’t.”
Math gets applied incorrectly all the time, like when the Hubble telescope was designed, or when Hansen estimated that sea level could rise 2-25 metres this century.
http://www.physics.utoronto.ca/news_repository/will-oceans-surge-59-centimetres-this-century-or-25-metres
Tenuc (01:26:00) :
I’m sure that when the historians of a hundred years hence try to explain the CAGW global scam, the first decade of the 21st century will be seen as the ‘tipping point’ of failure. Snow is such an obvious event that it can’t be fudged or hidden.
You’d think so, yet here I am in British Columbia well behind the snow line according to the Rutgers map supporting the data Goddard has presented. All week there has been no snow on the ground here, just little patches on the tops of the hills. I’ve driven for 80 miles N and 60 miles E of here and it’s the same there, unusual lack of snow and warm weather. Not even 10% snow cover here for miles around much less 39% so why does it show up yellow on the Rutgers map? It was similar on the NH/Vt border last week, so I suspect that the ‘record’ extent is in error. The lack of scepticism on here about an homogenized, gridded data set is interesting given the response to other such data.
Steve Goddard (20:18:09) :
Math gets applied incorrectly all the time
Nonsense. You can’t add 1 and 1 incorrectly. Your data could be bad or your assumptions wrong or in your case the trend not significant, but that is not incorrectly applied math [in your case not even applied].
“Pamela Gray (18:29:14) :
And since I catch (or rather try to) salmon in fresh water, they seem quite able to handle NO SALT at all, relatively speaking.”
Pamela, as you probably know, Pacific Coho were introduced into Lake Michigan, I believe in the thirty’s. They have a thriving commercial fishery there. We have a biologist here in Vancouver, out at UBC, who raises sockeye in fresh water tanks. Says that this is the way to farm fish, get em outta the ocean!
Does H2O precipitation pull a signifiant quantity of CO2 out of the atmosphere?
As near as I can figure a rainwater pH of 5.7 assumed to be all carbonic acid would indicate about 1gramme of CO2 for every 10 Tonnes of rainwater.
But hey it’s been a long time since ‘A’ level chemistry and I might have blown the maths…..:-)
Leif,
A good example of the incorrect application of mathematics :
Solar cycle 24, due to peak in 2010 or 2011 “looks like its going to be one of the most intense cycles since record-keeping began almost 400 years ago,” says solar physicist David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center. ..Hathaway and Wilson looked at records of geomagnetic activity stretching back almost 150 years and noticed something useful:. “The amount of geomagnetic activity now tells us what the solar cycle is going to be like 6 to 8 years in the future,” says Hathaway.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/21dec_cycle24.htm
Steve Goddard (07:02:40) :
A good example of the incorrect application of mathematics :
Solar cycle 24, due to peak in 2010 or 2011 “looks like its going to be one of the most intense cycles since record-keeping began almost 400 years ago,”
Absolutely not. No mathematics involved here, just cherry picking [a la your snow cover]. See page 31-33 of http://www.leif.org/research/Predicting%20the%20Solar%20Cycle.pdf
The reason they cherry picked the ‘wrong peak’ was to conform to the Dikpati et al prediction of a very large cycle which was at the time politically favored by NASA.
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.
THE KHAZAR JEWS WANT NWO,don’t believe in this GLOBAL WARMING CRAP,THEY ARE BEHIND IT,NO WONDER THE BIBLE CALL THOSE CRIMINALS,THE SYNAGOGUE OF SATAN,FAKE JEWS,KHAZARS,,REVELATION 2:9,3:9.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