From the University of Sheffield via Eurekalert:
Professor Edward Hanna and PhD student Richard Hall, from the University of Sheffield’s Department of Geography, are part of a select group of international climate scientists investigating links between Arctic climate change and extreme weather in the northern mid-latitudes.
They have found that while it is too soon to know for certain whether the Arctic played a role in persistent cold events during the extreme wet UK winter of 2013/14 and recent USA East Coast winters, new studies are adding to the growing weight of evidence linking increased Arctic temperatures with changes in mid-latitude weather patterns.
The research published in the Journal of Climate by Professor James Overland of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and authors from North America, Asia and Europe, including Professor Hanna and Richard Hall, paints a picture of links that vary by region and season.
Arctic temperatures are increasing two to three times faster than those at the mid-latitudes. Some scientists have suggested that warming Arctic temperatures contribute to weaker upper level westerly winds and a wavier jet stream. This wavier path may have caused cold weather conditions to stall over the eastern seaboard and midwest United States during recent winters, according to these theories.
Professor Hanna and Richard Hall note increased variability of the jet stream in winter and high pressure over Greenland, which has given more variable UK winters in the last few years. This includes the exceptionally stormy winter of 2013/14 which could have been partly influenced by climate change in the Arctic.
Professor Hanna said: “Our work presents tantalising new evidence of links between global warming, which is enhanced in high northern latitudes, and recent extreme winter weather events in the UK and further afield, as well as a timely review of much recent literature which has appeared in this important field of research. However, since the climate system is highly complex, many missing parts of the puzzle remain and much further work needs to be done.”
Professor Overland, lead author of the paper The melting Arctic and mid-latitude weather patterns: Are they connected? added: “We are in the pre-consensus stage of a theory that links continued warming of the Arctic with some severe weather events.”
A way to advance research from a pre-consensus stage is to further investigate the meandering jet stream and the connection between the warmer Arctic and the negative phase of an index showing the dominant pattern of sea level air pressure in the Arctic.
“We are where other major theories such as plate tectonics and El Niño were before they were widely accepted,” said Professor Overland.
“We need a Grand Science Challenge to advance weather forecasting abilities and climate change prediction.”
New studies on the changing Arctic together with additional Arctic observations will improve the ability to make forecasts for the mid-latitudes, helping millions of people better plan for the future and take steps to be more resilient in the face of extreme weather.
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NOTE: The press release is rather poor, not giving the name of the paper nor the DOI, something very basic. And, I don’t see it in the early releases at JoC. Anyone have a link to it?
UPDATE: Thanks to OKS – http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00822.1
Oh no. We are [snipped]. My old Alma Mater, was one of the best schools in the world. So sad. UQ is full of muppets, staff at QUT are just retarded, and now, Sheffield….DOOMED….
The pattern of weather in North America for the past two winters is the same pattern as the winter of 1976-1977. The December 1977 issue of National Geographic featured a story about that winter-weather pattern. The blame is put on what would generally be called weather: high and low pressure areas, prevailing winds, ocean currents, and varying water temperatures. But the story included the following assertion: “But a large body of experts believe it relates to a gradual cooling of the Northern Hemisphere….”
http://m4gw.com/1977-national-geographic-the-year-weather-went-wild/
ELcore,
The similarity between the pattern of 1976-1977 to our last 2 Winters in the US was great. 1977/78 also was very similar.
Huge ridge in the West up into the Northeast Pacific prevailing, with downstream teleconnection to deep troughing that at times develops into cutoff lows. The north to south component of air mass movement, driven by a strong northern stream in between the upper high and upper low, has at times carved out a cutoff low, resembling a Polar Vortex…….. this Winter in the Northeast, last Winter, farther west over the Great Lakes more often.
Steering currents, downstream from the northern latitude portion of the upper high have been able to tap into Arctic origin air frequently in this regime and travel very far south with it into the mid latitudes.
The term “Polar Vortex” last Winter became something that some folks connected to big incursions of this energy/cold as if they were extremely abnormal via the displaced upper level low that is “supposed to” be close to its average position near the pole.
This is wrong. In the Winter of 76/77 there were even more Polar Vortex events than in the past 2 Winters. 1977/78 featured a similar Winter pattern. This doesn’t happen very often but in certain Winters, the prevailing pattern, mostly dominated by a repeating natural cycle causes it to reoccur numerous times. In some Winters, it never happens.
We should be studying why this pattern occurred so frequently in the 1970’s(and previous decades), then less frequently during the following 2 decades and has returned recently.
If you want to pin it on increasing CO2(or less ice in the Arctic) , you first have to rule out the natural causes of the exact same thing happening naturally in the past.
Paul Homewood mentions (upthread) H.H. Lamb noting the
1914/15 (muddy trenches in WWI) and 1876/7 were also analogous with 2014/15. 1929/30 has been covered by Paul Homewood The similarities to the recent winter are striking.
Arctic air masses advancing far to the south, in the North Atlantic. (Think – jet stream!)
An open and clear airway.
Depressions accompanied by heavy rain and high winds followed one another in quick succession along this open pathway.
Disastrous floods and storms. https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2014/04/22/1929-the-year-the-met-office-tried-to-cover-up/
Thanks for your reply. (And thanks to Wayne Delbeke, May 21, 2015 at 10:09 am, below.) I remember the winters of 76-78 very well. I was going to college in Pennsylvania, an undergraduate in Math & Computer Science, and spent those winters commuting to school and walking the campus from building to building.
One big difference between those years in the 70’s, and the past few years, is the extent of cold air intruding into the deep south, and especially South Florida.
In the 70’s, a series of polar outbreaks began which continued into the 1980’s. Very large and very old groves of avocados and limes in the Homestead area, as well as citrus in Central and South Florida, were heavily damaged in the 1977 freeze, and several other severe freeze events during the 1980’s virtually wiped out citrus production north of the I-4 corridor.
The past few so called Polar Vortex years (We used to just call them polar outbreaks, or dips in the jet, digging troughs…etc) are notable for the lack of severe impact on Florida growers.
In the 1985 event, many groves consisting of trees 50 years old or more were destroyed in the areas around Orlando and Tampa.
I am not exactly sure if and how such polar outbreaks into Florida, and other relatively low latitudes, correlates with global climate patterns, but the cyclical nature of such events can be easily documented by researching the boom and bust cycle of growing citrus in the Sunshine State, going back well over a hundred years to the great freezes of 1894-1895, and beyond.
And my perspective may be somewhat skewed by being actively involved in agricultural pursuits in Florida in the 1980’s and 1990’s.
But I was also studying the relevant disciplines as an undergraduate at the time, and, although information was not as readily available in those days, my recollections and readings paint a somewhat different story.
It is stated that the so-called polar vortex events occurred more frequently in the 1970’s and decades prior, and less often in subsequent decades. If the history of severe and killing freezes in Florida is any indication of, though, the reverse is true.
Certainly freezes which were caused by polar outbreaks in the 1890’s, 1910’s, and 1950’s were not related to human induced climate change.
Some links:
Response of Florida citrus growers to the freezes
of the 1980s:
http://www.int-res.com/articles/cr/1/c001p133.pdf
EFFECTS OF THE 1977 FREEZE ON AVOCADOS AND LIMES IN
SOUTH FLORIDA:
http://www.avocadosource.com/Journals/FSHSP/FSHSP_VOL_90_PG_247-251_1977.pdf
http://miami.about.com/b/2009/12/03/does-it-ever-snow-in-miami-2.htm
Some Notable Polar Outbreaks in US History:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Cold_waves_in_the_United_States
“The cold wave brought human fatalities, deaths of wild and domesticated animals, crop losses, and infrastructure damage to homes, municipality and industrial sites. At least 126 deaths were blamed on the cold snap.[14] Some 90 percent of the citrus crop in Florida was destroyed in what the state called the “Freeze of the Century.”[15] Florida’s citrus industry suffered $1.2 billion in losses ($2.3 billion in 2009 dollars) as a result of the inclement weather, which killed nearly every citrus tree in central Florida, and forced the industry permanently into southern Florida”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_1985_cold_wave
An Old Event, So Bad and Memorable It is Simply Called The Great Freeze:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Freeze
http://www.palmsociety.org/members/english/chamaerops/032/032-12.shtml
The final nail in the coffin, ironic because it was the last severe freeze to hit Florida for the next 25 years and counting:
http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/1990-01-12/news/9001124725_1_grapefruit-crop-citrus-crop-freeze
Just checked the Great Lakes Ice page – Superior is down to .5% coverage on May 21st. Last year, the last ice day was June 6.
The highest coverage this winter was in the 88-89% range vs. 92.5% last year. It will be interesting to see what next year brings to the Great Lakes.
summer melt season looks below average temps-
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
Not only is it below average, but if you compare today with the past records this current depth of Arctic cold is unprecedented for this time of year.
The DMI 80N figure is strongly biased to the Pole itself, in fact the ice which is melting is nearer to 65ºN where record highs in the region of 70ºF are being experienced along the coast at Tuktoyaktuk Canada, Barrow etc..
Is finding a consensus in scientific terms like standing around and patting each other on the back and telling each other how “brilliant we all are” that we “maybe” found something we “might” be able to get money for… Especially relating to “Global Warming”?
ELCore – as many have noted from meteorologists and lay people from North America to China, the relatively consistent stationary high and low areas around the world wax and wane and affect the “flow” of our weather along with linkage to the rather long THC in the ocean.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/JCLI-D-14-00687.1
Climate changes. That we know. Why? Not sure it matters, we’ll adapt.
Speaking of which, I need to go seed my pastures so have a nice day all.
Perhaps they have it backwards. It is not the warming of the Arctic that is creating extreme cold elsewhere. It may be the cold going elsewhere that is warming the Arctic.
I’ve noticed that when the UK has high pressure and clear skies the ice tends to stay in the Arctic and when it’s wet and windy here, the ice pours down the side of Greenland draining the multi year ice away. Cause, effect or coincidence?
There seems to have been a link between the wide swings in the NH Sea Ice Anomaly and the run of poor summers in the UK between 2007 and 2012..
It’s not just the summer. You can see it in the winter too, although it’s not as obvious because the ice is building at the same time it is decreasing. Often a swift increase in ice area is actually bad news because it comes from a burst of Basin ice that is destined to melt in the Atlantic.
l think the thing to watch here is the persistence of blocking highs setting up over the NE Pacific.
Which drives warm air up into the Arctic over the northern Pacific as cold air floods down across eastern N America.This weather pattern seems to have become a increasing over the last two years or so. lf this continues over the last few years then l would expect to see climate cooling over the Atlantic side of the NH.
Above should have been “a increasing trend”
l think l will start again because l made a right “pigs ear” of my first post.
The feel thing to watch out for here is if the increasing trend of blocking highs forming over the NE Pacific that’s been happening over the last two years continues into the next few years. As this is highly likely to lead to climate cooling over the Atlantic side of the NH. Because l believe it was just the persistence of this type of regional weather pattern is what tipped the Atlantic side of the NH into the last ice age
How about linking the warming of the Arctic with the decline in hurricanes and tornadoes? That seems a stretch but, Hey!, this is climate science we are talking about. Right?
lts possible for there be a link between a warming Arctic and a decline in hurricanes. lf the warming of the Arctic is caused by cold air flooding down across N America and the northern Atlantic.
The arctic is cold or very cold or bloody cold. In your wildest dreams it will never be warm. The closer we get to the next ice age the colder it will get.
Stephen it should not be taken as a given fact that the Arctic is colder during a ice age.
Because the way the ice sheets spread over North America during the last ice age. Suggests in the NH at least that the last ice age started off as regional climate change in North America.
The conlcusions of this stuy were written long ago. This report is simply an update on how the data torturing and revisions are going.
I can imagine this future conversation between a dad and his son.
S “Dad, those people could send a satellite out of the solar system and into interstellar space, build aluminum tubes that could transport them at 600mph between continents, concentrate light into a cutting tool, carry conversations by light beams across optical fibers, build structures 1,500 feet tall, yet they were still superstitious enough to believe they had offended a weather god?”
D “Yep son, that was the consensus at the time.”
OK, TomJ, I’ll bite – Who makes up this group of believers that believe recent cold winters in the Eastern U.S., and rainy winters in U.K. were havoc rendered by an offended weather god? And what weather god has this consensus of belief? Or are you stating belief in the powers of CO2 have elevated that gas to god hood?
SR
Apparently NOAA is now claiming that sea levels are rising by more than 1 inch per decade.
http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/sealevel.html
What part of the Arctic is still warming? According to NCDC, Alaska average temperature trends from 2001…
January–December —
North Slope: −1.2°/decade.
Central Interior: −1.3°/decade
Northeast Interior: −1.7°/decade
Statewide: −1.2°/decade
October–March —
North Slope: −1.3°/decade.
Central Interior: −1.9°/decade
Northeast Interior: −2.3°/decade
Statewide: −1.7°/decade
The more I look at this the more I begin to recognize that these guys aren’t even very good weasels.
Phillip Bratby
May 21, 2015 at 11:40 am
Your are clearly not drinking the same brew as mosher
Anomalies stratospheric polar vortex caused declines in solar activity are the cause of the temperature rise in the Arctic.
http://cosmicrays.oulu.fi/webform/query.cgi?startday=01&startmonth=08&startyear=2014&starttime=00%3A00&endday=20&endmonth=05&endyear=2015&endtime=00%3A00&resolution=Automatic+choice&picture=on
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_JFM_NH_2015.gif
Faster melting of ice was caused by the peak of the positive phase of the AMO.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-amo/from:1980
We need a big fat grant because we say the right words.
Well on a positive note, physicists have yet to claim humans are causing the universe to expand too quickly and we must take action to stop it.
Maybe climate science can get a clue from that.
“The Arctic is warming two to three times faster than mid latitudes”….. Which show zero warming. 3×0= ??
need to use the good math:
The rate of warming is currently negative (cooling).
The arctic rate of warming is therefore, reasonably, three times as fast (cooling at a rate that is 1/3 of mid latitudes).
Love to know where these people get their Arctic data. Canada isn’t sharing and neither is Russia. They take up most of the Arctic. I bet they’ve used figures from Alaska which is only a tiny part of the Arctic.
Even during the last ice age Alaska was largely free of ice:
Looks like a long term polar vortex at work.
And more bad news that keeps on coming from Climate Central, the Antarctic is melting. Seriously, they are saying that not only is there less ice (its worse than they thought) it’s thin ice as well. I suppose that record sea ice growth is an illusion and the thickness of it being much more than estimates as well. The epic drought in Colorado I think is history, maybe it will be back next week. Along with record warmth, they could have fooled me, day time highs have been in the low 40’s F. I know it’s counter intuitive, the cold is really caused by the record warmth. ( mostly sarc)
Sounds good, but we’ll have to wait until it warms again in the arctic to check it out.
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/meant80n.uk.php
They are wondering if the arctic is responsible for cold winters to the south. My research is only anecdotal and observed over 3/4 of a century but I found cold weather is not coming from the south – especially since I’ve been spending more time in warmer southerly latitudes, probably one of the earlier climate refugees. Plus I remember that Winnipeg gets darned cold in January and February and when I went up to Snag River in the Yukon, in February it was even colder.