Thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic Hurricane Season

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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#101 Postby Kingarabian » Sun Mar 25, 2018 1:13 am

CyclonicFury wrote:
Kingarabian wrote:
CyclonicFury wrote:It is historically unusual to see a sharp transition from La Niña to El Niño. With a positive SOI at the moment and the Niño 3.4 region still running around -0.7C below normal, I doubt we will see anything more than a weak El Niño at most. It’s possible we could get warm neutral during the season and El Niño developing afterwards, which would likely really only impact the end of the season.


Don't look at the SOI right now. The pressures in Darwin are skewered due to the recent influx of TC activity.

Do you think El Niño is likely?


I'm still leaning towards a warm-neutral or just neutral for now. Hard to go against history, but as we all know, we still have a lot to learn about ENSO. IMO an El Nino during ASO has to be in the cards now since during the month of March, we've seen the atmosphere trending towards an El Nino state. We'll just have to wait and see, as it could be a false flag. Looks like another tough year for forecasters.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#102 Postby Pressure » Mon Mar 26, 2018 5:44 pm

To be honest I think there will either be no Niño or a weak Modoki. The Atlantic looks sorta like a -AMO so that's that,,, but here are my thoughts(for now):
11-14 NS
4-6 H
2-4 MH

Why?

There's lots of NS compared to H/MH which is because the cold water won't let anything strengthen too much( but the disturbances won't be as sheared so they do form unlike 2013)
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#103 Postby TheStormExpert » Tue Mar 27, 2018 7:30 am

Hints are that Phil K. may be going with an above average season when he releases his first 2018 Season Outlook on Thursday April 5th.

https://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/weather/hurricanes/hints-active-storm-season-but-low-confidence-early-forecasts/pXomWaGnuuI4lTObiOhbAK/
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#104 Postby CyclonicFury » Tue Mar 27, 2018 7:53 am

TheStormExpert wrote:Hints are that Phil K. may be going with an above average season when he releases his first 2018 Season Outlook on Thursday April 5th.

https://www.mypalmbeachpost.com/weather/hurricanes/hints-active-storm-season-but-low-confidence-early-forecasts/pXomWaGnuuI4lTObiOhbAK/

Surprised he is thinking that because of the recent cooling in the MDR and far North Atlantic, but that cooling is likely temporary.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#105 Postby NotSparta » Tue Mar 27, 2018 10:16 am

It appears that a lot of the cooling in the eastern MDR currently is not due to enhanced trades (they are actually suppressed), but the amount of SAL. Possibly, the SSTs may ride some on SAL outbreaks this spring (imo)
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#106 Postby OuterBanker » Tue Mar 27, 2018 11:30 am

I am surprised by all the El Nino calls here. Didn’t just about everyone predict El Nino last year about this time of year. We are still in the great spring deception time. I feel that mid-May is about the earliest that you can predict the hurricane season with any accuracy. Even Phil Klotzbach last year called for El Nino in hurricane season in April. You can see his hesitance in calling it for this year because of last year. Let’s face it calling the season in late March is almost as accurate as getting the NCAA men’s basketball bracket right (I was out the first day).
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#107 Postby cycloneye » Tue Mar 27, 2018 11:54 am

Eric Blake said it simple in a tweet on March 17.

@EricBlake12
Good luck making a seasonal #hurricane forecast when two of the top #ElNino models are making totally different predictions! Lots of uncertainty this year..


 https://twitter.com/EricBlake12/status/975011399414972416


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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#108 Postby Alyono » Tue Mar 27, 2018 12:23 pm

OuterBanker wrote:I am surprised by all the El Nino calls here. Didn’t just about everyone predict El Nino last year about this time of year. We are still in the great spring deception time. I feel that mid-May is about the earliest that you can predict the hurricane season with any accuracy. Even Phil Klotzbach last year called for El Nino in hurricane season in April. You can see his hesitance in calling it for this year because of last year. Let’s face it calling the season in late March is almost as accurate as getting the NCAA men’s basketball bracket right (I was out the first day).


The reason is that most here think anything from the EC is equal to that of a statement from God Himself, when the truth is the EC ENSO forecast typically is a steaming pile of dog manure. Saying that model has any ENSO skill is like saying a turd burger is as good as the Tomahawk ribeye at Carrabba's on Kirby.

I had been thinking some type of el niño. However, after seeing the obs, I am really questioning if we will not end up at least cool neutral yet again
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#109 Postby wxman57 » Tue Mar 27, 2018 2:58 pm

OuterBanker wrote:I am surprised by all the El Nino calls here. Didn’t just about everyone predict El Nino last year about this time of year. We are still in the great spring deception time. I feel that mid-May is about the earliest that you can predict the hurricane season with any accuracy. Even Phil Klotzbach last year called for El Nino in hurricane season in April. You can see his hesitance in calling it for this year because of last year. Let’s face it calling the season in late March is almost as accurate as getting the NCAA men’s basketball bracket right (I was out the first day).


Yes, most models were predicting El Nino at this time last year, and all were wrong. It's very difficult to predict El Nino during the spring. Current SSTs in the Tropical Pacific are way cooler than last March. El Nino looks unlikely.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#110 Postby NDG » Tue Mar 27, 2018 3:48 pm

All I know is that it took 4-5 years for El Nino to return after the Super El Ninos of '83 & '97, so odds are against El Nino returning this year after having the '15 Super El Nino.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#111 Postby Kingarabian » Tue Mar 27, 2018 3:59 pm

The models predictions for ENSO are composed of what's happening at the ocean's sub-surface (up welling or down welling Kelvin waves) and the wind activity over the equatorial Central Pacific. So what happened last year with the models was that, at the time of those forecasts we had a WWB and some warm anomalies at the depth. Westerly winds did not return and with a weak warm sub surface pool and no true down welling Kelvin waves, La Nina took over. I think it's beyond the models reach to accurately predict if the atmosphere is going to influence the ocean into an El Nino or a La Nina. Spring barrier or not.

So the same thing is happening this year. We shouldn't explicitly look at the models every single time. We should look at the present factors and compare them with previous years and go from there.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#112 Postby NotSparta » Tue Mar 27, 2018 4:12 pm

While there is more proof for an El Nino this year than last, the La Nina is too strong too late, so it's appearing that an El Nino would be too little too late, especially if the atmosphere stays against it.

But watch the spring barrier make me wrong by a long shot :lol:
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#113 Postby StruThiO » Wed Mar 28, 2018 12:08 am

OuterBanker wrote:I am surprised by all the El Nino calls here. Didn’t just about everyone predict El Nino last year about this time of year. We are still in the great spring deception time. I feel that mid-May is about the earliest that you can predict the hurricane season with any accuracy. Even Phil Klotzbach last year called for El Nino in hurricane season in April. You can see his hesitance in calling it for this year because of last year. Let’s face it calling the season in late March is almost as accurate as getting the NCAA men’s basketball bracket right (I was out the first day).


Alot of us are passionate about this stuff, hard to wait until May to say anything about it but you are completely right
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#114 Postby wxman57 » Wed Mar 28, 2018 8:30 am

Here's a comparison animation between March 26 of 2017 and current SSTs. Tremendous difference in the Tropical Pacific. Much cooler now than last March. Cooler in the MDR, too.

Image
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#115 Postby NotSparta » Wed Mar 28, 2018 8:36 am

wxman57 wrote:Here's a comparison animation between March 26 of 2017 and current SSTs. Tremendous difference in the Tropical Pacific. Much cooler now than last March. Cooler in the MDR, too.

[img ]http://wxman57.com/images/SST.gif[/img]


If the Atlantic can't shake the -AMO it doesn't look too active this summer, hopefully enhanced trades and SAL continues to cool the MDR
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#116 Postby wxman57 » Wed Mar 28, 2018 8:51 am

NotSparta wrote:
wxman57 wrote:Here's a comparison animation between March 26 of 2017 and current SSTs. Tremendous difference in the Tropical Pacific. Much cooler now than last March. Cooler in the MDR, too.

[img ]http://wxman57.com/images/SST.gif[/img]


If the Atlantic can't shake the -AMO it doesn't look too active this summer, hopefully enhanced trades and SAL continues to cool the MDR


An unfavorable MDR may be a bad thing for the Gulf of Mexico and East U.S. Coast. Systems would form farther west with less chance of recurving out to sea.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#117 Postby CyclonicFury » Wed Mar 28, 2018 9:22 am

It is interesting to note that as cold as the Atlantic MDR is, it is still warmer than the global tropics average - however, this is likely due to the La Niña which should dissipate by May.
Image
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#118 Postby 1900hurricane » Wed Mar 28, 2018 9:28 am

The Indian Ocean tropics is also running colder than normal oddly enough, which is actually a more common El Nino look. It's pretty unusual to have all three ocean tropics colder than average at the same time.
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#119 Postby TheStormExpert » Wed Mar 28, 2018 10:15 am

If the tropics globally are cooler than normal than wouldn’t a 2013 repeat be a possibility?
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Re: Very early thoughts on the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season

#120 Postby Shell Mound » Wed Mar 28, 2018 11:01 am

For the purpose of discussion, I decided to quote two of wxman57's posts from another thread:

wxman57 wrote:
wxman57 wrote:
wxman57 wrote: I plotted the AMO 1950-2018 using Klotzbach's new method, which precludes calculating it prior to 1950 due to missing surface pressure data. It is starting to look like the warm AMO may be ending. Certainly, recent years have been a good bit cooler. The plot below includes data through February, 2018.
Image

http://www.storm2k.org/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?p=2671301#p2671301


2017 was a warm AMO during the hurricane season except for July.

1 2017 -0.58
2 2017 0.08
3 2017 -0.61
4 2017 -0.81

5 2017 0.22
6 2017 0.06
7 2017 -0.89
8 2017 0
9 2017 0.31
10 2017 0.16
11 2017 0.39
12 2017 0.33
1 2018 -0.61
2 2018 -1.29


http://www.storm2k.org/phpbb2/viewtopic.php?p=2671305#p2671305


Here's a comparison animation between March 26 of 2017 and current SSTs. Tremendous difference in the Tropical Pacific. Much cooler now than last March. Cooler in the MDR, too.

Image

Some key points that I took from all this:

*The most recent +AMO was spikier than the last +AMO. For instance, there was greater year-to-year variation, and the peaks and valleys were sharper, which could account for the (possible?) early end to the most recent +AMO. Perhaps the intensity of this +AMO cycle, with its record-breaking warmth in 2010, can account for its premature demise, if indeed it is ending.
*Is it true that, all other factors being equal, tropical-Atlantic SSTs tend to warm more rapidly after a major SAL episode ends?
*The AMO was quite cool in early 2017, though not as cold as it is now. This reversed significantly in early summer, leading to an active season. Could such a reversal happen in 2018, too?
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