The 2010 Snowmageddon event was quickly seized upon in an NYT op-ed by global warming zealot Al Gore as yet more proof of…climate…warming…mumble.. something.
Yet in this NASA article highlighting a new peer reviewed paper, global warming/climate change isn’t even mentioned. Hmmm, who to trust?
From NASA: Deconstructing a Mystery: What Caused Snowmaggedon?
In the quiet after the storms, streets and cars had all but disappeared under piles of snow. The U.S. Postal Service suspended service for the first time in 30 years. Snow plows struggled to push the evidence off of major roads. Hundreds of thousands of Washington metropolitan residents grappled with the loss of electricity and heat for almost a week.
By Feb. 10, 2010 the National Weather Service reported that three storms spanning from December to February in the winter of 2009-10 had dumped a whopping 54.9 inches of snow on the Baltimore-Washington area. The snowfall broke a seasonal record first set in 1899. Snowmaggedon, as the winter was dubbed, entered the history books as the snowiest winter on record for the U.S. East Coast.
Two years later, scientists are still searching to identify the unique set of conditions that enabled storms of this magnitude to occur. To determine a direct cause to infrequent but major winter storms, Siegfried Schubert and colleagues Yehui Chang and Max Suarez – all of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., – became detectives.
Schubert is a meteorologist and senior research scientist for Goddard’s Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO). Using a computer model that simulates the atmosphere, called the Goddard Earth Observing System Model, Version 5 (GEOS-5), Schubert pieced together the meteorological whodunit of 2010’s ‘Snowmaggedon.’
“There are things that we know that affect storminess over the U.S.,” Schubert said. “One is when there is an El Niño, which tends to favor more storms. Given the connection between El Niño and sea surface temperatures, we thought we’d actually do a modeling study to see if we could pinpoint the role of sea surface temperatures in driving the snowstorms.”
This is a satellite image of one of the massive “Snowmaggedon” blizzard systems in February 2010. Notice the distinctive comma-shaped cloud pattern. Credit: NASA/GSFC
Warmer Pacific Can Mean Stormy Atlantic
El Niño is an ocean-atmospheric climate pattern characterized by unusually warm sea surface temperatures and heightened rainfall in the central and eastern tropical Pacific. The increased rain occurs when warm sea surface temperatures heat the surrounding air, which then rises and condenses into rain clouds. The end result of these changes in the tropics is a shifting of the extra-tropical air currents, or jet streams. Changes in the jet streams can then alter storm paths around the globe.
Over the U.S., El Niño tends to produce an unusual eastward extension of the Pacific jet stream and storminess across the southern tier of states. Using the GEOS-5 model, Schubert and his team isolated the role that sea surface temperatures played in changing the storminess across the Northern Hemisphere. By initializing the model with the early December 2009 atmospheric conditions and the higher sea surface temperatures from that time, Schubert and his colleagues were able to reproduce many of the subsequent changes in winter storminess.
“El Niño is predictable on monthly and seasonal time scales. But we know that sea surface temperatures don’t control everything about the atmosphere,” Schubert said. “Storms develop in the atmosphere whenever they decide to as a result of instabilities. Models can’t replicate the actual sequence of events in predictions extending beyond a few weeks, but they can predict whether or not there will be more or fewer storms, because of the sea surface temperatures.” Schubert and his team ran 50 different simulations, slightly changing the atmospheric conditions each time while keeping the actual sea surface temperatures the same. In the end, the data showed that the storms were influenced more by the sea surface temperatures, and less by the changing atmospheric conditions.
“The atmosphere is chaotic, but if we do this over and over again, slightly changing the initial conditions, we can average the runs, filter out all the random atmosphere variability and see the part that’s driven by sea surface temperatures,” Schubert said.
Getting Snow Instead of Rain
While El Niño tends to produce greater storminess, it does not necessarily lead to more snowstorms along the East Coast. Without colder temperatures, these storms bring just rain.
Cue the second culprit: a fluctuation of the atmospheric pressure differences in the Atlantic between the Icelandic low-pressure field and the Azores high-pressure field further south. The North Atlantic Oscillation, as it is called, controls the strength and direction of westerly winds, as well as storm tracks across the North Atlantic. Scientists cannot predict these fluctuations very well. But it is known that in a positive phase, the north-south pressure difference is enhanced and the west-to-east winds are strong, effectively creating a wall that keeps cold air in the Arctic. In the negative phase, the north-south pressure difference is reduced, allowing cold Arctic wind to bear down across the North Atlantic.
“It’s a structure that tends to favor cold temperatures on the East Coast when it’s in the negative phase,” said Schubert. While the atmospheric pressure fields oscillate at daily and weekly time scales, the winter of 2009-10 saw the North Atlantic Oscillation in a strong extended-negative phase. Combine the resulting influx of Arctic air for an unusually long period of time with the moisture and storminess from El Niño, and the once fuzzy cause of these monster storms starts to come into focus. The research shows that the extreme weather over the Eastern U.S. in the winter of 2009-10 was part of a response mainly to El Niño and its associated Pacific Ocean sea surface temperatures.
The results were then compared with those of a winter (1999-2000) characterized by having completely opposite conditions: a La Niña and a positive phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation. When compared with Snowmaggedon, the winter of 1999-2000 showed less storminess and decreased chances of snow. This comparison helped Schubert and his team corroborate the hypothesis, confirming that El Niño-induced sea surface temperatures and an extended negative phase of the North Atlantic Oscillation caused the changes in 2009-10 winter storminess.
Predicting Another Snowmaggedon
In order to improve snow predictions, scientists need to better understand how the North Atlantic Oscillation works and what causes it to stay in an extended period.
There is evidence that the extended negative mode is impacted by sea surface temperatures and maybe even snow cover in Asia. Scientists, however, have not directly linked any one weather variable to the North Atlantic Oscillation.
“People have done these historical studies before to come up with measures, and if you look at the record of major snow storms, some have occurred during El Niño winters and a negative North Atlantic Oscillation phase,” Schubert said. “But sea surface temperatures impacting storminess in the different ocean basins has never been quantified and it’s never been clear what is a relative contribution and in what way they are contributing,” he added.
Richard Seager, a research professor at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University, also studies how El Niño and weakened atmospheric pressure contributes to snow anomalies.
“This model not only confirms that a negative North Atlantic Oscillation and El Niño conditions created the conditions that allowed these storms to form,” said Seager, who did not work with Schubert on this research. “But it is useful in showing how the atmosphere can act differently when combining El Niño with different sea surface temperatures. These models provide controlled conditions, which allow us to be sure about the exact causes,” Seager added.
Scientists have predicted that current La Niña conditions and below-average sea surface temperatures might be the cause for the mild 2012 winter on the Eastern U.S. Examples like this, Schubert said, is why it is important to better understand the relationship between sea surface temperatures and storminess. “People want to know whether it’s going to be a snowy winter. Snow prediction is developing but if we predict El Niño, we know it will be more likely stormier. Now whether those storms will be rain or snow depends on the North Atlantic oscillation, which is a big challenge for us because of its constant oscillations.” Schubert and his team’s extended findings on the role of sea surface temperatures in Snowmaggedon will be published in the Journal of Climate this spring.
Christina Coleman
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
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All of these “A cause other than AGW is found to explain an extreme event” threads are based on a strawman. Nobody claims that AGW alone will be the cause of an extreme precipitation event, extreme heat event, etc. Clearly, extremes always involve extreme weather situations to set them up. The question is rather whether AGW “loads the dice” so-to-speak so that these extreme events occur more often, e.g., the one-in-100-year floods start happening once every 20 years.
And, I am not claiming that in this particular case it has been demonstrated that AGW did make such a snowmageddon event more likely. But showing particular causes for this particular extreme event is not going to provide evidence that AGW did not make it more likely. It alone provides no evidence in either direction on that question.
“The increased rain occurs when warm sea surface temperatures heat the surrounding air, which then rises and condenses into rain clouds.” ???
I thought it was the other way around ?
Or does the CO2 dissolved in the water exert its magical powers here as well and trap heat or – oh, stuff it, that argument won’t wash – “the warm sea surface temperatures heat the surrounding air” ?
“Storms develop in the atmosphere whenever they decide to as a result of instabilities. Models can’t replicate the actual sequence of events in predictions extending beyond a few weeks, but they can predict whether or not there will be more or fewer storms, because of the sea surface temperatures.”
Now hang on a minute – is CO2 the main climate driver or not – sounds like these guys are sceptics ?
Good heavens! And you’re telling me these people actually get paid for this ‘work’?
I used to have a teacher when confronted with such matterial would describe it as ‘waffle’.
Here’s an analogy for you.
I’m sure very few of the very sensible readers of WUWT smoke cigarettes but many will have seen a cigarette burning as it sits in an ashtray in a ‘still’ room.
Close to the tip, a continous column of smoke rises vertically…as the column gets longer it begins to waver until it reaches a certain point where it twists, curls, falls, coils, writhes, wreaths and ultimately dissipates and disperses into a generalized fog.
Any efforts the modellers make to predict the behaviour of such a process would be laughable and only end in failure. Yet squillions of dollars are currently being wasted on trying to use super computers to predict weather and climate which although taking place on a slower and grander scale is ultimately as chaotic.
There was a time, before the power of Computing was fully understood, when it was naively believed that if you had a big enough, fast enough machine you could use it to successfully project these processes into the future. I think that era is past.
Computer modelling certainly has an important and valuable role in processes and situations where constant/stable/measurable/repeatable processes are at work. Weather is not one of these.
Joel Shore says:
February 10, 2012 at 12:42 pm
“All of these “A cause other than AGW is found to explain an extreme event” threads are based on a strawman. Nobody claims that AGW alone will be the cause of an extreme precipitation event, extreme heat event, etc.”
Cue the Turbocharged Weather Pattern… Get ready, Brenda.
Joel Shore says: February 10, 2012 at 12:42 pm
“… Nobody claims that AGW alone will be the cause of an extreme precipitation event, extreme heat event…”
Joel, that is not exactly true. A few weeks ago I attended a discussion at my university moderated by faculty members from various science departments. The first words out of the geology professor’s mouth were “settled science”. Another warned about the increase in the number of storms and and their intensity. When I pointed out that F2 and above tornadoes had decreased over the last 50 years (see here:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/severeweather/tornadoes.html ) and that ACE was at a 30 year low (Maue, R. N. (2011), Recent historically low global tropical cyclone activity, Geophys. Res. Lett., 38, LXXXXX, doi:10.1029/2011GL047711.), his first response was “junk science” and then demanded to know how I could explain the recent tornadoes in the south. Attribution of particular events to AGW is alive and well and being taught in university classrooms.
Check out these videos from: http://iceagenow.info/2012/02/villages-buried-4-5-meters-snow-video/ if you want to see some more global warming snowmageddon. Hope they can resque these people!!!
Remember the old cereal commercials? “Chocolate covered sugar bombs are part of this nutritious breakfast, along with whole grain bread, orange juice, and egg whites.”
Same thing with global warming: every event has to include global warming. “The tide is high, due to the position of the moon and global warming.”
Silver Ralph says:
February 10, 2012 at 10:54 am
“And in answer to Leif Svaggard’s comments that recent low sunspot numbers and long sunspot cycles have not caused any cooling, I would beg to differ.”
Beg all you want, but at least get the concept correct. It is not Leif’s or anyone else’s responsibility to prove how the sun DID NOT cause something. It is up to the person claiming a cause to show the mechanism between cause and effect. You have cold. The Sun has low SSNs. What’s next?
“I come from a state that raises corn and cotton and cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I am from Missouri. You have got to show me.” [Willard D. Vandiver]
http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/Missouri/NicknameMissouri.html
The idea that AGW causes snow is so obtuse that it has resulted in the adherents being seeing as clowns by the general public.
Snowmageddon? Yeah, phooey. The only thing of great magnitude, was the lack of preparedness for real winter. Just ask anyone who lives in the SE lee of the Great Lakes – Cleveland or Buffalo, fer instance.
Joel Shore says:
February 10, 2012 at 12:42 pm
“. . . the one-in-100-year floods start happening once every 20 years.”
There are many people that may still think the statement has some validity. It doesn’t. Once in your head, you can’t flush it. Too bad. You can suppress it, though. Please do. Thanks.
Joel Shore says:
February 10, 2012 at 12:42 pm
The question is rather whether AGW “loads the dice” so-to-speak so that these extreme events occur more often, e.g., the one-in-100-year floods start happening once every 20 years.
AGW science tells us a positive NAO/AO is more likely to dominate. This would suggest less storms like Snowmaggedon in a CO2 controlled world. More study into the northern polar vortex would be money better spent.
John F. Hultquist says:
February 10, 2012 at 2:22 pm
Beg all you want, but at least get the concept correct. It is not Leif’s or anyone else’s responsibility to prove how the sun DID NOT cause something. It is up to the person claiming a cause to show the mechanism between cause and effect. You have cold. The Sun has low SSNs. What’s next?
There is a lot of research for the past 3 decades doing exactly that, primarily aimed at the low solar/jet stream link. The trouble is most people (including you?) are not aware of this research.
Combine the resulting influx of Arctic air for an unusually long period of time with the moisture and storminess from El Niño, and the once fuzzy cause of these monster storms starts to come into focus
—————
Which paraphrases exactly what I said at the time and all the time since. it’s pretty darn obvious.
And Al Gore said that the amount of snow, has as a contributing factor, sea surface temperature. And that therefore more snow is not a disproof of global warming.
I a pretty sure that climate skeptic land missed out on the subtleties of the logic in “not a disproof”.
If memory serves, based on this elementary misunderstading of basic logic, one of the Cato institute’s eccentric economists wrote an opinion piece claiming that Al Gore was a liar because Al claims that higher SSTs can produce more snow. The economist in question then got confused about the distinction between troposphere and stratosphere. The Cato institute needs better economists I think.
Latitude says:
February 10, 2012 at 10:09 am
While El Niño tends to produce greater storminess, it does not necessarily lead to more snowstorms along the East Coast. ……Without colder temperatures, these storms bring just rain.
====================================================
We knew that without the computer games
====================================================
Wow! An admission from Latitude that the computer games got the right answer. Progress is being made.
Ack says:
February 10, 2012 at 10:21 am
But they told us there would be no more snow
——————————
They were vague about when and where. Most likely a generation from now when we have clocked up another 2C. I am certain they did not mean now this minute.
They also said if the gulf stream slows down Europe could get a lot colder, but at the moment they have gone off that idea.
So sorry, if you want make up a story to discredit someone, you should know that there are people out there who notice when you misrepresent what was actually claimed.
Charles Gerard Nelson says
Any efforts the modellers make to predict the behaviour of such a process would be laughable and only end in failure.
————————
No. While you can’t reproduce the exact curls of the smoke you don’t have to, to get understanding. Computer modeling of turbulent processes combined with experiments is a lot more powerful as a way of obtaining understanding than experiments alone, since the modeling fills in the gaps not accessible to experiments.
LazyTeenager says:
February 10, 2012 at 3:17 pm
“Ack says:
February 10, 2012 at 10:21 am
But they told us there would be no more snow
——————————
They were vague about when and where. Most likely a generation from now when we have clocked up another 2C. I am certain they did not mean now this minute.
They also said if the gulf stream slows down Europe could get a lot colder, but at the moment they have gone off that idea.
So sorry, if you want make up a story to discredit someone, you should know that there are people out there who notice when you misrepresent what was actually claimed.”
So you acknowledge that IPCC consensus climate scientists are being intentionally vague to avoid being called on their bluff. Thanks. You are learning.
LazyTeenager says:
February 10, 2012 at 3:05 pm
“And Al Gore said that the amount of snow, has as a contributing factor, sea surface temperature. And that therefore more snow is not a disproof of global warming. ”
Is there anything that can disprove Global Warming? The IPCC consensus climate scientists always have a study that they can show that exactly explains what just happened. If the opposite happens, no problemo, we have another study for that, look here.
‘Snowmaggedon’
the warmists do have a neat explanation to the casual observer.
at best we might see some warmist considerations for cold weather – at the expense of ‘green energy’ projects.
a pertinant question to the warmist might be, ‘how many years do you expect these cold weather events
to continue for?’ ‘how do propose to supply electricity to enable daily living in stricken areas, given current inadequacies of solar/wind technologies?’
obvious to me is the necessary suspension of efforts to reduce CO2 emissions on electricity grids.
there is no energy crisis, other than that created erroneously. coal ? okay, maybe it’s a finite resource, oil ? renewable when I last looked. gas ? more ‘renewable’ than oil ? nuclear ? nice to see Obama rubber- stamping new nuclear power stations. electro-magnetic ? the elephant in the room ?
canada has a cure for cold conditions, aka nuclear energy.
LazyTeenager says:
February 10, 2012 at 3:29 pm
“Computer modeling of turbulent processes combined with experiments is a lot more powerful as a way of obtaining understanding than experiments alone, since the modeling fills in the gaps not accessible to experiments.”
That’s complete hogwash. What gap that is not accessible is filled in by a weather model?
The research indicates that warmer ocean temperatures are closely associated with events such as the “Snowmaggedon” as the energy and moisture to move all that water must come from somewhere. Ocean heat content is much higher than 30+ years ago. Climate models show ocean heat content will continue to rise with increasing CO2. Snowmaggedon is consistent with AGW…not proof, just consistency of expected effects.
R. Gates says:
February 10, 2012 at 4:30 pm
Snowmaggedon is consistent with AGW…not proof, just consistency of expected effects.
Wrong again Gates. AGW science tells us we will have mostly positive NAO/AO conditions. It seems you, like the gravy train want it both ways