Summary:
La Niña conditions continued across the equatorial Pacific.
The magnitude of negative sea surface temperature anomalies continued to decrease across the Pacific Ocean.
A transition to ENSO-neutral conditions is expected by June 2011.
Ensemble forecast:
All models indicate that La Niña will continue to weaken in the coming months.
A majority of models and all three multi-model forecasts indicate ENSO-neutral conditions by May-June-July 2011 (Niño-3.4 SST anomalies between -0.5C and +0.5C ), continuing through the rest of 2011.
Complete report here:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf
h/t to WUWT reader Pamela Gray
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Deanster says:
The Devil in me hopes they are right, and that Global Temp will fall back to pre-1995 levels ..
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… assuming there is such a known and valid metric as Global Temperature, or that any entity with the tools and techniques to track it is trustworthy…
Wonder how long-wave radiation parameters are incorporated into the other dynamical models, and I wonder if this part of the program is the wild cat.
http://iri.columbia.edu/climate/ENSO/currentinfo/models/COLA_Anom.html
Re: vukcevic
Looking forward to your article vukcevic. While I don’t always agree with all of your ideas, there are often elements of your presentations that SHOULD be on mainstream radars. Your efforts to stimulate attention to ignored key relations is an important contribution.
The NASA GMAO model is the best model. NCEP CFS, ECMWF and the two Japan models are okay.
ALL of the rest are not worthwhile even looking at. They are so far off the majority of the time that is surprising they are still being operated. Consequently, the average should not be taken into account either.
This page lets you review each individual model prediction over the last two years – click on the model name on the right side. You can also go back into the archives and view the last several years.
http://iri.columbia.edu/climate/ENSO/currentinfo/modelviews.html
In terms of where we are going, it is clear that an El Nino will be starting very soon.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ocean/weeklyenso/wkteq_xz.gif
http://sharaku.eorc.jaxa.jp/AMSR/elnino/201104/P1AME110428SST000500ANOM.png
RR Kampen says:
April 28, 2011 at 1:28 am
Actually Niño has just started. By July it will not be neutral, but full Niño
Your prediction has been noted
kalsel3294 says: “Keep an eye on the JPN-FRCGC forecast. I have found them consistently far more reliable than ANY of the others. Note also how their forecast differs considerably from all others. Their forecast from about 2 years back is still on track.”
Noooo….. can’t take any more negative SST anomalies… it’s too cold… please say it isn’t so….
A sliver of colder water off the Peru coast has persisted for a couple of months. Could this represent incipient upwelling? This could be a fly in the ointment for those craving an el Nino. The ENSO is a nonlinear oscillator as we all know, and could be at a cusp right now able to flip either way.
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst_anom.gif
This Subsurface Pacific Ocean Equatorial Temperature Anomaly graphic really helps to show the transition from La Nina to neutral over the last several months;
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/sub_surf_mon.gif
and can be found, along with an array of other ENSO info, on the WUWT ENSO Reference Page:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/enso/
Bill Illis says:
April 28, 2011 at 7:18 am
The NASA GMAO model is the best model.
I look through that report every week, and based on what I’ve seen over the last 2 years I would say none of the models work well.
NASA GMAO seemed underdamped to me, but perhaps that is incorrect. Your link showing the past model runs suggests that although NASA GMAO is getting the shape correct, it is biased. Most of the NASA GMAO model runs do no fall on top of the actual, they are off (high or low and they do not cross the actual). So if NASA GMAO is the best, then my idea that the whole lot are poor is strengthened.
phlogiston says: “A sliver of colder water off the Peru coast has persisted for a couple of months. Could this represent incipient upwelling? This could be a fly in the ointment for those craving an el Nino. The ENSO is a nonlinear oscillator as we all know, and could be at a cusp right now able to flip either way.”
When it gets a little bigger, that upwelling (a normal La Nina feature) IMHO is what triggers the El Nino. The colder eastern Pacific and the air above it rise in density and especially in viscosity, presenting a stiffer, more massive obstacle to the trade winds. The trade winds stall a bit, allowing the lump of water in the western Pacific to slosh eastward, creating El Nino conditions. What do you think, phlog? Vuk? Bill?
I’m confudded. The graphic at the very top, which is also on the WUWT reference page, already shows the anomaly in the “neutral” range, at -0.37. Wassup?
Can someone confirm for me that La Nina is when temp anomalies are more than
-0.5c and El Nino is when temp anomalies are more than 0.5c. I see comments about tipping from one to the other when surely it must go through a nuetral stage in the middle.
Can anyone recommend a book on general weather/climate phenomonae? Usually I’d just go to Amazon but I don’t want to end up with a political text. Thanks.
jorgekafkazar says:
April 28, 2011 at 10:19 am
phlogiston says: “A sliver of colder water off the Peru coast has persisted for a couple of months. Could this represent incipient upwelling? This could be a fly in the ointment for those craving an el Nino. The ENSO is a nonlinear oscillator as we all know, and could be at a cusp right now able to flip either way.”
When it gets a little bigger, that upwelling (a normal La Nina feature) IMHO is what triggers the El Nino. The colder eastern Pacific and the air above it rise in density and especially in viscosity, presenting a stiffer, more massive obstacle to the trade winds. The trade winds stall a bit, allowing the lump of water in the western Pacific to slosh eastward, creating El Nino conditions. What do you think, phlog? Vuk? Bill?
A good explanation of the ENSO system can be found at:
http://stratus.astr.ucl.ac.be/textbook/chapter5_node4.xml
One phenomenon of interest is the “Bjerknes feedback” – Bob Tisdale told me about this recently.
Bjerknes, J., 1969: Atmospheric teleconnections from the equatorial Pacific. Mon. Wea. Rev. 97, 163-172.
As the above link shows, this is a positive feedback linking Peruvian upwelling to easterly trades, exactly the same mechanism proposed in the recent post about the ENSO being a nonlinear oscillator of the Belousov-Zhabotinsky type:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/01/25/is-the-enso-a-nonlinear-oscillator-of-the-belousov-zhabotinsky-reaction-type/
(At the time I did not know that this feedback was already established as the “Bjerknes feedback”.)
Returning to jorgekafkazar’s comment, no – I think the effect of upwelling is the opposite – it does not “block” trades in the sense that dense air blocks anything, but the reverse, it establishes a pressure gradient (denser air east, less dense air west) driving and reinforcing the trades – and in turn reinforcing upwelling. Thus upwelling is a precursor to La Nina, not el Nino.
But will it “catch”? – that is the question.
geo says: April 28, 2011 at 10:36 am
I’m confudded. The graphic at the very top, which is also on the WUWT reference page, already shows the anomaly in the “neutral” range, at -0.37. Wassup?
There are different El Nino regions as illustrated by this map:
http://ioc-goos-oopc.org/state_of_the_ocean/sur/pac/map-pac-EquCylproj.jpg
The chart at the top of this article and the WUWT ENSO Reference Page is only 3.4 region:
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/monitoring/nino3_4.png
Following Geoff’s link above from BOM…
Would the key indicator of a change from Nina to Nino be a slowing down of these trade winds ? I take it that they are responsible for maintaining the warm water to the west and easing of the trade winds then allows warm water to slosh back east.
Is the trade wind a leading or lagging indicator?
All the indicators including the Trade Winds, SOI, Cloud Cover, Outgoing Long-Wave Radiation, Global Water Vapour Levels, Atmospheric Angular Momentum, Global Temperatures (in other words, the Earth’s Climate since these are the big climate indicators) are either concurrent with the Nino 3.4 temperatures or lag behind it by 3 months except for one which leads it …
The East Equatorial Upper Ocean Temperature Anomaly which is itself led by the West Equatorial Upper Ocean Temperature Anomaly.
http://img714.imageshack.us/img714/3158/ensoepuothamar11.png
This is tracking to about +0.6C in April.
Love, love, love this thread. It’s so……weather. And I love discussions about weather. But then I am also into weather pattern variation and don’t give a flying fig about climate change.
Bill Illis says: “The East Equatorial Upper Ocean Temperature Anomaly which is itself led by the West Equatorial Upper Ocean Temperature Anomaly. http://img714.imageshack.us/img714/3158/ensoepuothamar11.png”
Good find. There are a few times when NINO3.4 SST anomalies don’t track, most noticeably during the rebound from the 1988/89 La Nina. It’ll be interesting to see what the surface does this time.
Regards
The top analogue years used in statistical models and at the end of the NOAA ENSO weekly discussions are not an opera glove fit. Which works for me. It’s far more interesting to see what doesn’t fit than what does. It is endlessly fascinating. Reminds me of women. Each one is so different from the next. Like good wine and top notch chocolate. The same year slapped with the same label can have an entirely different taste between two bottles on the same shelf. And don’t even get me started on dark chocolate. HUGE difference between brands.
…now what was I talking about…oh yeh…weather. What a woman. By the way, it is snowing here.
Bill Illis says:
April 28, 2011 at 5:08 pm ,
Thanks, Bill, and I will second Bob’s comment about that link being a good find. Certainly looks like a good correlation of two hot topics of late, that is ENSO3.4SST and ocean heat content (oh, well the anomaly).
By eyeballing, 84-85……..leads by one year.
87…….. going the opposite direction
2001 to 2010……… seem to match
It is just that I am looking for a physical mechanism to move the equatorial waters and it seems to me that the trade winds are doing the ‘sloshing’, powered no doubt by the OHC. Perhaps there is a better, more direct connection between trade winds (and they do not have to be a single entity) and ocean height.
Rhoda Ramirez says:
April 28, 2011 at 12:11 pm
Can anyone recommend a book on general weather/climate phenomonae? Usually I’d just go to Amazon but I don’t want to end up with a political text. Thanks.
Don’t fantasize. Nothing you can read is without an agenda. Here is one exploration of weather/climate that starts out by outlining the philosophy behind the approach. It’s for free at:
http://www.happs.com.au/images/stories/PDFarticles/TheCommonSenseOfClimateChange.pdf
If the past is to be our guide we are odds on for La Nina to persist until solar maximum.
I’m sticking with analogue year observations that come with similar weather pattern parameters. A zebra cannot change its stripes though each one is an individual, and CO2 does not have enough energy to overcome God’s hand at painting stripes. So for me, I’m going to say neutral to possibly weak El Nino through the summer, then back to a strong La Nina by late fall. By the way, it is still snowing here in NE Oregon. I will be driving through about 6 inches of snow on the road after work today on my way to Wallowa County. Someone needs to warm that woman up.
Pamela Gray says:
April 29, 2011 at 7:05 am Someone needs to warm that woman up.
Try hot milk with German chocolate melted in, add pure cream and finish with a marshmallow. (less trouble than a ‘someone’ 🙂 )