A U.S. weather blurb from Accuweather

[SubTropicRay]

"Cold Air Shots Are Not A Pattern Change

Wednesday, January 03, 2007

I DON'T SEE A MAJOR PATTERN COMING YET, ONLY SHOTS OF COLD AIR, AND THAT REALLY IS NOT A PATTERN CHANGE IF IT WARMS UP AFTERWARDS....

Video will be on when I get in the office...Snow map is coming today for the storm in the Plains and Great Lakes...

I know, I know, I know ... the talk out there amongst many meteorologists that a major pattern change is coming, but I just don't see it yet. Below are the graphs of the Arctic Oscillation (AO), North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) and the Pacific/North America Oscillation (PNA). Notice that the AO is forecasted to tank negative which is what people are keying on because it means that cold air could be heading back into Canada and the U.S. But also notice the NAO and PNA, no real change over the next 2 weeks. So what I am saying, and I want to make this clear, the winter pattern for the most part is set. While we will see surges of cold air coming through the East, overall, trying to make up for the lack of snow is going to be hard. In addition, temperature deviations from normal may be on the cold side for a few days, but the deviation from normal on the warm side will outweigh the cold side when we look back at the winter.

I asked the question about snowless winters in the East and I was swamped with many e-mails about the winter of '72-'73. By the way, I do read all the e-mails that come in. I may not reply to all of them because I would be up until 3 a.m. every night doing so, but I do like to read everyone's thoughts on the weather. Now, the '72-'73 winter was a strong El Nino year. To give you some idea, the SOI values for 1972 were..

1972 Nov -3.4 1973 Jan -3.0

So far in 2006 Nov was -1.4 and Dec -3.0

The higher the values, the stronger the El Nino, so as you can see, the El Nino was much stronger in 1972 compared to 2006. So I don't think there is any significant correlation between the two winters, other than it was depression for snow lovers.

Take a look at the images below, and you decide if a major pattern change is coming or not. Again, I think it's a winter for wild swings and we may just see the wilder swings coming now, but overall, the winter will be known for the warmth... "

PNA

image unavailable

Updated: 1/3/2007 8:58 AM

[BobbyinNY]

Ray,

I just had someone come into my office at work and yell at me... they said: "It's your fault we have no snow..... You and your damn Palm Trees"... I just smiled and said I wished I had that kind of power

[happ]

Thanks Ray for sharing your insight     I tend to agree that this ENSO is indecisive.  I am encouraged that models are in agreement into next week.  Possible big rain event for SoCal    

Australian Bureau of Meteorology suggest possible El Nino weakening :

http://www.terradaily.com/reports....99.html