El Nino

Well it is warm here in Wisconsin,47 degrees today. Normally I would be standing on 6 inches of ice doing some perch fishing. OH WELL.:)

It takes more components than warm ocean surface temps to make an El Niño "wet".

97-98 was near normal in temps and rainfall on the coast of Michoacan, and I came north twice during the winter to Tucson. I read about the flooding in California.

The JET STREAM must collaborate to bring moisture. And steering mechanisms are influenced by high and low pressure regions and movements. This is what steers the jet stream.

For a soaked California, the SOUTHERN jet stream must migrate northward. A Pineapple Express must form and continue. When pulses stretch from the Philippines to North America via the jet stream then lots of moisture can take place.

A mere ENSO event is one component. Anyone who tries to extrapolate an ENSO event into hard and fast specific region rainfall predictions is either a fraud or a fool. A jet stream ENSO event can be a mere two to three hundred miles wide at the extreme.

Yes, I have a minor in meteorology. It protects me against being gullible for news-worthy buzz words. Like EL NINO



Here is an excerpt from a USA TODAY article (verbatim)

Extreme weather and natural disasters account for quadruple as much television network news airtime as they did during 1990s, yet this actually deters viewers from taking precautions and actions. People reportedly find the inundation of information overwhelming, and therefore preventative actions are thought futile.

The idea that too much sizzle is being served up to viewers along with too little substance has been framed as "weather porn." Sure, disaster sights are provocative, but they can also serve to inform. This is where weather news largely falls down. Sights are left for viewers to see and reports for viewers to hear. What about what viewers can do?

Does anybody remember what Mexico's Pacific coast was like the winter of '97/98?

Warm & dry in Mazatlan. The last storm had little impact other than muddy roads that are dry now. Should be the last major storm of the season. El Nino will have no negative impact on a Snowbird enjoying Mexico IMHO.

rocmoc n AZ/Mexico

Depressing as it will be, maybe we should just plan to stay home this winter because being cooped up in a 1700 sq. ft. house in California is slightly more appealing than being cooped up in a truck camper in a Mexican beach town because at home, at least, there are always projects to complete and better TV programming. Your thoughts, folks?

...there may be a compelling argument siding on avoiding potential regions, where El Nino driven anomalous weather events (mapped by WX people back in October) can put your property (or, life) in danger.

The other side of the coin is "probability" of something anomalous happening in one's snowbirding region (ie. something as benign as miserable rains for 2 or 3 months; or something as threatening as region-wide frequent or prolonged flooding). So, how do you "forecast" bad weather over a small area (a campground; a town; an RV lot) 1 or 2 months from now?

Everyone will have to make up their own minds whether to go or stay home.

These spreadsheet graphs show the frequency of hydro-meteorological disasters by type (drought; flood; other: wind storms and temperature extremes) for La Nina and El Nino years, from 1975 to 2002:

influence of ENSO on disaster frequency-->

*the researchers note that the rising frequency of disasters are duse to the greater number of people and wealth moved into high-risk geography & increased reporting of disasters

We will winter in Florida anyway, knowing that on the temperature side, it very generally appears that the part of Florida we will be snowbirding at will experience much warmer temps this January and February than had happened in 2014 and 2015; BUT, we also know that it very generally appears that Florida (the region we will be snowbirding at) will experience much more frequent and prolonged rains during January and February. We contrast these probable scenarios with a Quebec winter (even a relatively warm one): no contest. Better 65~72F and rainy in Florida than 29F~38F and freezing rain weekly in Quebec :B

Depressing as it will be, maybe we should just plan to stay home this winter because being cooped up in a 1700 sq. ft. house in California is slightly more appealing than being cooped up in a truck camper in a Mexican beach town because at home, at least, there are always projects to complete and better TV programming. Your thoughts, folks?

....oh, BTW: the 2015 Pacific hurricane season is the "2nd most active" since hurricane recording commenced...

This El Nino is particularly strong (looking at the most recent 3 month Region 3.4 number).

The "positive feedbacks" related to the pulsing above average surface Pacific (ie. very warm Pacific band just about mirroring the equator, with pools of discrete warmer water off southern-western Mexico and Guatemala, and Baja peninsula) is severely altering the weather now in North America, Mexico, Central America, and South America (west coastal regions) and up-slope areas.

...now the kicker in the realm of "forecasting" is: forecasting the "weather" lies in the realm of short-term POINT location prediction (ie. is it going to rain, snow, ice-storm, flood, tornado, hail the size of baseballs over the top of my trailer, or head, or my snowbirding route south . So, at the scale of El Nino, it would be nary impossible to make a prediction for the airspace above your trailer, house or "route" at all. However, at the scale of "mesoscale or smaller micro-scale forecasting", the WX people can indeed forecast the weather 5 minutes, 5 hours, or ~2 days over your town (or, Mexican Pueblo) quite accurately AND, attribute the probable macro-cause at the synoptic scale to an El Nino event (ie. due to a southern-branch jet split/diversion, due to the strong El Nino region 3.4 anomaly).

On edit: it is possible to do very, very generalized "anomaly maps" at the continental scale, showing very, very roughly where the anomalous temperatures and precipitations will occur, for example, for the 2015/2016 winter. However, at the micro-scale, it would be a stretch to point forecast what it will be like over your town or property 1, 2, 4, 6 months in advance.

be there on the 11th. for some reason my emails do nto go through to you soemtimess, will call after we cross back into US on the 8th

Great blog. Love your photos. Can't wait to see you guys. We'll bring the camper - guest room - home