Texas Spring 2017

[Ntxw]

To update on ENSO, there has not been any significant WWB's in February or March so far and none modeled for the foreseeable. Most sig strong events usually have them at least in the initial phases. It's likely we won't see any El Nino coupling or resulting pattern this spring given the slow nature of ENSO progression. Trades have strengthened near the dateline so if anything the next 3-4 weeks the tropical Pacific still resembles more like La Nina.

850u anoms


I've been watching for the buildup of warm waters 100-150m below the surface, while there is some warmth it isn't as expansive as you would expect with an oncoming El Nino at least not yet. Thermocline is still fairly steep, showing Nina-Neutral

[aggiecutter]

Meteorologist at the Porta Storm Weather Center after another winter with no snow:

[Ntxw]

All guidance have a pretty good consensus after the next cool spell, anomalous warmth for the plains near the equinox

[CaptinCrunch]

This weekends rain is defiantly needed!

[weatherdude1108]

Those thundershowers are popping and spreading out a little, heading into San Antonio. Not sure if they'll make it as far as Austin. Wonder if JDawg512 sees it(?).

I mulched by beds and top-dressed my entire yard the past couple days, over and already moist soil profile. Would be icing on the cake to get a little soaking from Mother Nature to settle it in and keep it moist before growing season ramps up.

[JDawg512]

Storms are now blowing up over southern Travis County moving into my area. Was outside watching the clouds but came inside due to the lighting. Love it!!!

[JDawg512]

The heaviest core of rain is probably over the Portastorm Weather Center. Just light rain to an occasional quick moderate burst but nothing significant here in the middle of the southside.

[weatherdude1108]

The heaviest core of rain is probably over the Portastorm Weather Center. Just light rain to an occasional quick moderate burst but nothing significant here in the middle of the southside.

Ominous dark clouds here to my south. No rain here. Not sure if we'll get anything. Seems to be losing its vigor as early evening approaches.

[JDawg512]

The heaviest core of rain is probably over the Portastorm Weather Center. Just light rain to an occasional quick moderate burst but nothing significant here in the middle of the southside.

Ominous dark clouds here to my south. No rain here. Not sure if we'll get anything. Seems to be losing its vigor as early evening approaches.

Seemed a little odd by how they developed, almost like a seabreeze. Erratic slow movement with new storms forming off of dying storms. Something we would typically see in June rather than early/mid March. Was interesting for sure.

[weatherdude1108]

The heaviest core of rain is probably over the Portastorm Weather Center. Just light rain to an occasional quick moderate burst but nothing significant here in the middle of the southside.

Ominous dark clouds here to my south. No rain here. Not sure if we'll get anything. Seems to be losing its vigor as early evening approaches.

Seemed a little odd by how they developed, almost like a seabreeze. Erratic slow movement with new storms forming off of dying storms. Something we would typically see in June rather than early/mid March. Was interesting for sure.

Yeah, did seem like more of a June setup with the downdraft/outflow interactions, spurring random popups somewhere else.

[bubba hotep]

To update on ENSO, there has not been any significant WWB's in February or March so far and none modeled for the foreseeable. Most sig strong events usually have them at least in the initial phases. It's likely we won't see any El Nino coupling or resulting pattern this spring given the slow nature of ENSO progression. Trades have strengthened near the dateline so if anything the next 3-4 weeks the tropical Pacific still resembles more like La Nina.

850u anoms
http://i68.tinypic.com/1552w4y.gif

I've been watching for the buildup of warm waters 100-150m below the surface, while there is some warmth it isn't as expansive as you would expect with an oncoming El Nino at least not yet. Thermocline is still fairly steep, showing Nina-Neutral

SSTs are clearly ENSO neutral now and the CFS starts to switch things up just beyond the time frame of that image.



It also starts to transition OLR anomalies around the same time frame, so those combined are a pretty good signal that the transition should begin shortly. I don't see a strong or even mod el nino in the cards, at this time, but crazy stuff keeps happening. The combo of +PDO/-AMO (? it has been dropping) and transitioning ENSO, should at a minimum keep, Texas from falling into drought this summer and it may even keep us wet.

[Ntxw]

I sure hope so! We haven't had a cool summer in awhile (2014 was semi nice). I'd love for a wet summer with minimal 100 days . Westerly winds alone isn't enough though you still need the ocean to couple otherwise it will be just atmosphere driven which is not reflective of a true ENSO event and can opt to change quickly with ebb and flow of CCKW's and MJO. I don't believe 2017 will be drought-y, the NIna simply was too weak and too short lived to permeate a severe drought. Weak El Nino's don't start early, they typically don't show up until after SON period maybe JJA (1951 and 2004 are the two earliest cases). Moderate events can manifest by May or June.

Meanwhile quite the blizzard for the east coast. 2ft in some spots early next week. A good .75-1.5" or so rains for DFW, Austin, and Houston

[Brent]

Sure would be nice to not have too bad of a summer but I'll withhold judgement. I did notice most of the bad summers had record heat very early so that'll be something to look for going into April.

[wxman57]

Just a quick note to announce that I'm back online after a 2 year hiatus following Comcast's decision not to host websites. I managed to acquire the domain "wxman57.com".

I have my very old and outdated site "WorldWide Weather" uploaded as a test, but one page I've been maintaining is my hurricane links page.

http://www.wxman57.com/hurricane.html

I'll get the pages back up describing how to make meteograms (plus the Excel files) this weekend.

Oh, my worldwide radars page is up too. If you know of any more, let me know and I'll add them in:

http://wxman57.com/radars.html

[Portastorm]

Great news, wxman57! I shall bookmark it now.

Meanwhile we saw some nice scattered rains around Travis County yesterday and are anticipating more today. We all gotta get what we can this weekend as things look to dry out for awhile following.

[Ntxw]

I don't know about snow, but perhaps a good system to round out the month?

[JDawg512]

:uarrow:

Great news, wxman57! I shall bookmark it now.

Meanwhile we saw some nice scattered rains around Travis County yesterday and are anticipating more today. We all gotta get what we can this weekend as things look to dry out for awhile following.

Very true, I don't like it one bit. My favorite month of the year isn't the wettest month of the year but I love it more when March is wetter than average.

You were the winner for most rain last evening for sure. That cell went right over scenic southwest Travis County. Barely got enough to register more than a trace here. It was that darn downdraft that came through that ruined the propagation further east across south Austin. Here's hoping for better luck today.

I knew the way the storms developed was very seabreeze like, even EWX mentioned it in their overnight discussion.

There's also mention of an outflow across the northern edge of the county warning area but I agree with the morning update that there may not be much development along it due to the amount of activity along the southern coastal plains area.

[Brent]

I don't know about snow, but perhaps a good system to round out the month?

March gonna be colder than February at this rate... 34 at DFW at the end of the run. Maybe it won't be hot when my parents visit at the end of the month.

[JDawg512]

Starting to see shower development along a boundary over northeast Travis Co.

[JDawg512]

Well nothing came of that...

Not sure we'll see much happen in Austin just going by conditions outside. Maybe someone will get lucky but it looks like the atmosphere is fairly stable over the city.

Hope everyone has a good day.