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Normally quiet and reserved WeatherBell senior forecaster Joe D’Aleo (co-founder of the Weather Channel with John Coleman) almost never writes (email subject lines) like this. When he does, it gets my attention. A new forecast shows the cold blast in the eastern half of the USA extending well past Groundhog Day, Feb 2nd, according to their models. WeatherBell has had an excellent track record this winter so far. He says he hasn’t seen anything like it since 1918 when the big flu pandemic hit the USA. Have a look:
D’Aleo writes in a follow up email about the forecast graphic below.
This is the GFS model depiction of the mean anomaly (in degrees C) for the 16 day period through 12z on February 6th.
It covers the coldest period of the winter season climatologically in most areas. The other global models agree through at least 10 days. This is the most severe run thus far. We have been alerting clients to it for weeks. Here is the day by day anomaly for the mean of the GFS ensemble runs which agree on the steadiness and generally the severity of the cold.
The mainstream media blames it on global warming of course.http://news.yahoo.com/global-warming-freezing-104500272–politics.html
UCAR downplayed the last brutal cold as being brief unlike the cold of the 1970s and 1980s.http://www2.ucar.edu/atmosnews/opinion/10928/cold-but-brief
Lets revisit their insightful analysis after the next few weeks.
1917/18 and 1993/94 were winters Joe Bastardi and I have been looking at. See the similarity of the SSTA in the Pacific in Jan/Feb 1918 to this year.
January 1918:
January 2014:
That warm pool in the Gulf of Alaska drives the persistent Alaska and western ridge and downstream cold vortex. That year had an extremely cold January.
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Powerful stuff. readers may recall that 1918 saw the great flu pandemic in the USA.
WeatherBell models expert Dr. Ryan Maue adds:
http://twitter.com/RyanMaue/status/425700249076654080
Meanwhile, weather, not climate, is hitting the US government hard:
Federal Government Shuts Down for Snow Storm Offices in Washington, D.C., are closed for the second time this winter.
Snow falling in Washington area; 4 to 7 inches expected, as flights canceled across US
This is going to be serious for a lot of people. Over the past few decades I think we have allowed a lot of our infrastructure to slip. We are going to see some serious problems with people being able to stay warm in places like IN, OH, WV and PA. Ohio already declared an “energy emergency” yesterday and suspended all rules concerning driver hours for energy delivery vehicles. Propane and heating oil is in short supply and the roads are bad. Distribution is suffering. Once the lakes freeze over, things could get even colder. The lakes are a significant moderating force in the weather in the surrounding areas. Once they freeze over, not so much.
The Great Lakes have an excellent chance to freeze over completely, from Duluth to Kingston. Bout half way there now.
Canadian Ice Service
So, if it does stay cold will global warming be blamed or will credit be taken for carbon reductions over the past 5-6 years?
Are there any predictions farther out? Just curious…..Europe had a pretty wild March last year. Any chance we may see something along those lines here?
We have been for quite a while highlighting the return of extreme cold the rest of the month but are questioning the GFS 11-15 day a bit. The GFS probably is overdone in that time frame. JB believes at least the cold core could shift west a bit. In 1918, February warmed in the southeast but it stayed cold northeast and in the west and March was warmer for the CONUS. When I composited all the Gulf of Alaska warm pool years it stayed cold in the same places (though less so) in February then the cold shifted west and south and Canada warmed. Interesting challenges ahead. Next few weeks should be wild at least. Even if it turned out like 1918, the cold north warm south should make it stormy in between in February like late last winter and spring. 1994 has also been a good analog although it may have been in Pinatubo and in part weak El Nino.
Richard of NZ says: “Umm, readers might remember that 1918 saw a global influenza pandemic. The spread was probably highlighted by the return home of millions of men from the Great War, many in cramped and somewhat insanitary conditions, already weakened by their experiences over the preceding 4 years.”
US soldiers returning from the Great War didn’t have a 4 year experience, and soldiers in the trenches were healthier than just about anyone else alive at that time. They were hardly physically “weakened” by the war. more likely just the opposite. Nor were any of the
“unsanitary conditions” of relevance to contraction of the flu virus, which in fact hit the youngest (and healthiest) the hardest. Nor were “cramped conditions” a requirement for getting the highly contagious flu virus. Nor did D Aleo make any claims of a connection between the weather and the pandemic. He simply noted another well known event during that time period.
Other than that …
Robert Bissett says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:44 pm …
Naw… I agree with
jorgekafkazar says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:36 pm
My grandparents lived through this on a homestead near Saco Montana. What they told agreed perfectly with what jorgekafkazar said. They said that the flu hit some people quite hard and knocked them right off their feet so to speak. They usually lived. For others it was more of a low grade chronic thing and they usually died. They never mentioned mortality having anything to do with being in the war or not, although those returning from service would have of course played a part in spreading the disease. By the way… Saco was’t a very good place to try to grow wheat at that time… climate change I guess 🙂 .
Robert Bissett says: January 21, 2014 at 12:44 pm “It is now know that most of those fatalities were actually the result of aspirin toxicity. Medicos were dispensing the stuff by the half-handful hourly. Once toxic symptoms showed, back off a bit. Look it up.”
D’you mean like here? Karen M. Starko (2009). “Salicylates and Pandemic Influenza Mortality, 1918–1919, Pharmacology, Pathology, and Historic Evidence”. Clinical Infectious Diseases 49 (9): 1405–1410. doi:10.1086/606060 – http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/49/9/1405.full.pdf+html
Over the next week there will be a lot of cold air from the arctic flooding down across the NH because of the weather patterns. Not only is there a strong arctic blast down across eastern USA. But there is also likely to be a huge shallow area of low pressure setting up over northern Russia. Which will draw a lot of air across the arctic circle and then send this chilled air flooding down across western Russia.
At suggestion of a moderate ‘lukewarmer’ climate scientist, I have assembled enough data to show that the Northern Hemisphere climate is directly responding (with somewhat surprising double bite) to the solar activity. If its projection comes to reality then January 2024 will be more like January 1814 rather than the one of 1914.
Richard of NZ says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:13 pm
Umm, readers might remember that 1918 saw a global influenza pandemic. The spread was probably highlighted by the return home of millions of men from the Great War, many in cramped and somewhat insanitary conditions, already weakened by their experiences over the preceding 4 years.
If an example must be used to show the effects of a particular weather situation, please use a valid one.
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Sever cold impacts hugely the body’s ability to fight and recover from infection.
Next?
Thanks arthur4563, I was running something like that through my mind – I don’t need to bother now.
You want cold? I’ll show you cold!
The winter of 1976/77 that everybody 50 or older remembers well.
Go to the link below, which will allow you to access reanalysis data(weather maps) from NOAA going back to 1948. There are 4 panels.
Look how many times the “circumpolar vortex” is forced south in December/January.
You will see it dropping south into Canada numerousl times in December 1976, then at the end of December, into the United States. Again in mid January 1977 it drops into the United States and a 3rd time at the end of January 1977 is in the US.
Put in a starting date of (year)1976 (month)11 (day)26 (cycle) 00 or a date earlier
Put in an ending date of 1977 02 02 or any date later than that
Advance the maps a day at a time using the +. or go back with the –
http://www.hpc.ncep.noaa.gov/ncepreanal/
Eric says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:52 pm
Don’t forget that the Farmer’s Almanac predicted this back in August for the Super Bowl….
The comments at the beginning of the thread in that link are priceless, best laugh of the day.
How would you know if the federal government is working or not, what with EPA employees on sabbatical with other agencies (not) and IRS union workers not really working because they didn’t get their usual massive requested budget increase, and all others in DC on 4-day work weeks with work from home status on the other day?
timetochooseagain says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:44 pm
I would note that I independently Identified a connection between the warm anomaly in the North Pacific and the US weather pattern then extant back in December;…..
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Several weeks ago, I made an unusually poor comment regarding solar changes and changes in the Pacific NW where I live. Mainly, I did not finish my thought with the reasons which initiated it, and I meant to ask a question instead of making a statement in regards to the thought.
What started all of this was the warming right at the end of November. There was a warm flow through the Bering Strait into the Arctic, which slowed down the rapidly growing sea ice. At the same time, nighttime temperatures in No California, where I live, rose 20F. The daytime warmed gradually and lately it has been spring during the day, although the nights are chilling down again. So both the Arctic warming and the warm regional temp develop shortly after the increased solar activity in November. That is why I made a comment several weeks which Alan Robertson responded to firmly, as in what the heck are you talking about.
Here is the question I meant to ask ” Is it possible for a rapid increase in solar change to translate to a rapid change in any of Earth,s regions? Could the Pacific Ocean react to the increased solar activity within a short time frame, and is that why I felt such change as I live about 70 miles inland from the Pacific. The atmospherics around here are strongly influenced by the Pacific, and I have always sensed nature, deeply.
And here in Northern CA we’re wearing shorts with so little precip that Folsom Lake looks like the river it was before the dam.
22 Jan: West Australian: Passengers rescued from Russian ship stuck in Antarctic ice arrive in Hobart on Aurora Australis
The Russian ship became stuck in thick sea ice at Commonwealth Bay on Christmas Eve…
The passengers will spend the next few hours clearing quarantine.
The expedition leader of the Russian ship, Professor Chris Turney, and the Aurora’s captain will address the media later this morning.
Scientists on board the Russian ship had planned research projects as they retraced the voyage of Sir Douglas Mawson to the frozen continent a century ago…
The Russian ship’s rescue has delayed Australia’s research program and the Antarctic Division says it will attempt to recoup costs.
Professor Turney has been forced to defend himself from criticism that he was too inexperienced to take the ship into Antarctica’s Commonwealth Bay.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/technology/a/20929234/52-tourists-and-researchers-rescued-from-antarctic-ice-return-to-hobart-this-morning-on-the-aurora-australis/
I have a special request for extra cold at the official (MA) residence of Edward Markey. What is the absolute freezing point anyway?
A couple of comments regarding the spread of the so-called Spanish Flu in 1918.
First, the epidemic began to peak in Eastern North America in November and December 1918, not the end of the previous winter at the start of 1918.
Second, this influenza was known as the Spanish flu because it was first identified as a pandemic when it spread through troops in Europe, and subsequently crossed the Atlantic with returning Canadian and American troops.
Regarding the vaccine issue: A wonderful resource about the history and development of vaccines is here:
http://www.historyofvaccines.org/
With this pattern is there any chance of moister for the west coast? No rainy season at all for the west coast so far. They could sure use the rain and mountain snow.
pat (January 21, 2014 at 1:44 pm) said “Passengers rescued from Russian ship stuck in Antarctic ice arrive in Hobart on Aurora Australis” but didn’t mention that Professor Chris Turney returns to an award for his achievements… http://blogs.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/timblair/index.php/dailytelegraph/comments/and_the_award_for_best_global_warming_prediction_goes_to/
22 Jan: SMH: Nicky Phillips/Colin Cosier: Antarctic field trip a factor in ship becoming trapped in sea ice on Christmas Eve
A four-hour delay on a passenger field trip in Antarctica may have contributed to the Akademik Shokalskiy becoming trapped in sea ice on Christmas Eve….
“The captain and his staff up on the [ship’s] bridge did not look happy,” said one passenger, who asked to remain anonymous.
By the time the ship departed the ice edge after 6pm, shifting sea ice had already blocked the escape route. The Akademik Shokalskiy was stuck by 3am…
In addition to the field-trip delay, the director of the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre, Tony Press, said the satellite images his organisation provided to the AAE before it entered the sea ice-prone area ”showed where the sea ice was located and the weather forecast predicted increasing winds, which would tell you that the sea ice could move”.
From midday on December 23 passengers were transported from the ship on snow vehicles over five nautical miles of ice to the Hodgeman Islands.
“Everyone on board was keen to make the journey across the fast ice to the Hodgeman Islands,” said one passenger.
A weather forecast predicted 25-35 knot winds reaching 40 knots late in the day.
“Despite the wind and extreme cold, the scenery on the journey was spectacular – it seemed unreal, as though we were on a movie set,” said the same passenger.
About 2.30pm the weather deteriorated. At the same time Captain Kiselev saw slabs of sea ice moving into the open water channel from which the ship had entered the area. He called for everyone to return.
A passenger standing near Professor Turney overheard the voyage leader, Greg Mortimer, telling him over the radio to bring passengers back to the ship so it can leave.
But minutes later, Turney drove six more passengers into the field.
The overloaded vehicle had no space to collect returning passengers.
Turney, Dr Fogwill and Mr Mortimer all declined to answer questions about the events of December 23.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/antarctic-field-trip-a-factor-in-ship-becoming-trapped-in-sea-ice-on-christmas-eve-20140121-316xp.html
Resourceguy January 21, 2014 at 1:45 pm
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0 Kelvin or so
Richard of NZ says:
January 21, 2014 at 12:13 pm
Umm, readers might remember that 1918 saw a global influenza pandemic. The spread was probably highlighted by the return home of millions of men from the Great War, many in cramped and somewhat insanitary conditions, already weakened by their experiences over the preceding 4 years.
If an example must be used to show the effects of a particular weather situation, please use a valid one.
The first case in the U.S. was reported January 1918 in Kansas while the troops were leaving for France, not coming back. The first U.S troops didn’t even go to battle until the spring of 1918. Give it a second and let that soak in.