December 2014 Observations for the Pacific Northwest

[snow_wizard]

Link please?

 

The site I was looking at it on is down.

 

I always know there is nothing interesting coming for the next few weeks when I get even slightly interested in checking the CFS.

It shows the previous day's model run, but I always use this one.

 

http://www.woeurope.eu/cgi-bin/expertcharts?LANG=eu&MENU=0000000000&CONT=namk&MODELL=cfs&MODELLTYP=1&BASE=-&VAR=tpps&HH=396&ARCHIV=0&ZOOM=0&PERIOD=&WMO=

[BLI snowman]

Another CFS run today showing a cold snap in the much talked about late Dec - mid Jan period.

 

[wx_statman]

Two different stations had the sub freezing mins on the 12th.  At first I thought the Snoqualmie readings had to be wrong, but two stations...no way.  Both stations also had a ridiculous number of sub 40 mins in July.

 

I just dug around at the NCDC. I think you're onto something.

 

Some lows on 7-11-1901:

 

31 at Sedro Woolley

34 at Eastsound

36 at Snohomish

38 at Snoqualmie Falls

 

And even colder on 7-12-1901:

 

30 at Snoqualmie Falls

34 at Sedro Woolley

36 at Willapa Harbor

37 at Aberdeen

37 at Bellingham downtown

37 at Eastsound

37 at McMinnville

37 at Olympia (Priest Point)

[wx_statman]

Hands down the most erratic temps I've seen...at least to this point in the season.  I have bounced from double digit positive to double digit negative departures multiple times now.  Looking very likely a double digit plus will pop up again soon.

 

We've had a hell of a time trying to stay normal since about June. Not much has been normal about our weather since.

[snow_wizard]

I just dug around at the NCDC. I think you're onto something.

 

Some lows on 7-11-1901:

 

31 at Sedro Woolley

34 at Eastsound

36 at Snohomish

38 at Snoqualmie Falls

 

And even colder on 7-12-1901:

 

30 at Snoqualmie Falls

34 at Sedro Woolley

36 at Willapa Harbor

37 at Aberdeen

37 at Bellingham downtown

37 at Eastsound

37 at McMinnville

37 at Olympia (Priest Point)

Extraordinary when you consider we can hardly get below 50 after July 4 anymore. It must have been a really rare setup. This is even more impressive than the crazy cold mins in July 1949.

 

I didn't know there were old records from Snohomish. How far back do they go?

[BLI snowman]

I wasn't aware of those minimums, but they sound a bit suspect. I do know that both July 1901 and 1902 had major cold troughs to begin the month. The

1902 event was probably the most significant cold trough we've seen in July in the era of modern observations.

 

The deformation zone in July 1987 always intrigued me. High of 47 in Bend on 7/18, and EUG had 2.41" of rain that day.  High at DLS was 71. Crazy stuff.

[wx_statman]

Extraordinary when you consider we can hardly get below 50 after July 4 anymore. It must have been a really rare setup. This is even more impressive than the crazy cold mins in July 1949.

 

I didn't know there were old records from Snohomish. How far back do they go?

 

I'm not sure. I was using the sort by day feature at the NCDC. Gives a snapshot of every reporting station for just that day, back to 1900.

[wx_statman]

The deformation zone in July 1987 always intrigued me. High of 47 in Bend on 7/18, and EUG had 2.41" of rain that day.  High at DLS was 71. Crazy stuff.

 

Yeah that's the best mid-summer trough we've ever seen. There were stations in Lake and Harney Cos. with highs in the 41-43 range.

[BLI snowman]

Yeah that's the best mid-summer trough we've ever seen. There were stations in Lake and Harney Cos. with highs in the 41-43 range.

 

Yep, and an inch of snow at Crater Lake.

 

Early August 1956 was a beast, as well.

[MossMan]

7drHiqr.gif

Wow, I stared at that for too long!

[Brennan]

I think maybe they’re just making thermometers differently than they did 100 years ago. That is probably what all this hype about global warming is about... Faultily made thermometers.. I’d believe it... 

[wx_statman]

Yep, and an inch of snow at Crater Lake.

 

Early August 1956 was a beast, as well.

 

That's a good one too.

 

In our time there was mid-July 1996....

[wx_statman]

I think maybe they’re just making thermometers differently than they did 100 years ago. That is probably what all this hype about global warming is about... Faultily made thermometers.. I’d believe it... 

 

Thermos were probably fine. The placement and sheltering was a much bigger issue.

[IbrChris]

I would love to see more details on this if possible.

Have at it

 

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/cgi-bin/data/composites/plot20thc.day.v2.pl

[IbrChris]

Thermos were probably fine. The placement and sheltering was a much bigger issue.

Yep, people noted "in the sun" temperature and "at the ground" temperature back in some of those 19th century observations. For instance at New Westminster on Jan 16, 1862 the ground temperature fell to -15 but the low was -2 at standard observing height (probably between 4-6 feet above ground level). Also in the same year New Westminster had an "in the sun" temperature of like 106 but the highest shade temperature recorded was 86. Some of these errors are obvious and get QC'd easily upon inspection, others aren't as easily noticed and crop up in the official records as unlikely/implausible records. Take the 119 at Pendleton, OR in 1897 as an example, it was a simple averaging of readings taken around town that varied from 114 to 123.

[IbrChris]

For extreme cold in late summer check out the truly arctic blast in late Aug 1910 which affected mainly E WA-E OR and ID/MT. Many major stations recorded their August record low in that event...there were numerous lows from upper 20s to lower 30s across eastern WA with 15-25 across some valley portions of Montana and Idaho. In August.

Looking at the mean 500 mb pattern from Aug 23-25, 1910 it looks very classic arctic blast for the northern Rockies. Sprawling amplified ridge in the Gulf of Alaska and deep trough centered over Manitoba extending into the northern Plains along with another ridge centered over the Maritimes.

[IbrChris]

That's a good one too.

 

In our time there was mid-July 1996....

In our time (most of us) there was summer 1993...biggest dud in a generation, but not quite on par with some of the really bad ones in the 1950s. Summer 1993 was the coldest (Jul-Aug) on record in the 20th century for the northern Rockies and portions of the Intermountain West though...by a wide margin.

[IbrChris]

I know this has nothing to do with anything we are talking about right now, but I just found some astonishing information from July 1901.  I have a long term project I'm working on to transcribe the Seattle weather records onto the Excel spreadsheet that I like so much and found some pretty chilly looking low temps so I looked at records for Snoqualmie Falls and Sedro Woolley for that month.  As it turns out July 1901 had multiple low temps below 40 including one sub freezing min at both stations.  Snoqualmie dropped to 30 on the 12th and Sedro Woolley shows 31 on the 11th.

 

I cannot even imagine the upper level pattern it would take to cause that so deep into the summer.  Such an occurrence would be devastating to agriculture if it were to repeat.

 

I'm sure wxstatman will appreciate the incredible rarity of this and knowing him he probably already knows about it.  No doubt this climate is capable of producing great surprises at pretty much any time of year.

Nice trough along the west coast with a ridge over the Northern Plains/Great Lakes. Looks like a tropical system off Cape Hatteras as well. Weak positive height anomalies present over the Gulf of Alaska toward the central Pacific. This would be a decent pattern in winter for a modest modified arctic event favoring BC and northern WA. Orientation of the trough suggests potential for decent lowland snow west of the Cascades with NW flow but a fairly short over-water trajectory.

 

Source: ESRL 20th C reanalysis

 

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/tmp/composites/compday.70.96.228.67.339.18.53.3.gif

[wx_statman]

Yep, people noted "in the sun" temperature and "at the ground" temperature back in some of those 19th century observations. For instance at New Westminster on Jan 16, 1862 the ground temperature fell to -15 but the low was -2 at standard observing height (probably between 4-6 feet above ground level). Also in the same year New Westminster had an "in the sun" temperature of like 106 but the highest shade temperature recorded was 86. Some of these errors are obvious and get QC'd easily upon inspection, others aren't as easily noticed and crop up in the official records as unlikely/implausible records. Take the 119 at Pendleton, OR in 1897 as an example, it was a simple averaging of readings taken around town that varied from 114 to 123.

A lot of haphazard observing back in those days. Take the Australian heat record. A reading of 128 that stood since 1889 until a skeptical researcher looked into it about 10 years ago. He found out that readings that summer were taken under an empty beer crate at that location. At least the BOM had the good sense to invalidate the record.

[wx_statman]

For extreme cold in late summer check out the truly arctic blast in late Aug 1910 which affected mainly E WA-E OR and ID/MT. Many major stations recorded their August record low in that event...there were numerous lows from upper 20s to lower 30s across eastern WA with 15-25 across some valley portions of Montana and Idaho. In August.

Looking at the mean 500 mb pattern from Aug 23-25, 1910 it looks very classic arctic blast for the northern Rockies. Sprawling amplified ridge in the Gulf of Alaska and deep trough centered over Manitoba extending into the northern Plains along with another ridge centered over the Maritimes.

August 1910 and August 1992 were the two greatest late summer cold waves in the northern Rockies. Nothing else like them.

[IbrChris]

A lot of haphazard observing back in those days. Take the Australian heat record. A reading of 128 that stood since 1889 until a skeptical researcher looked into it about 10 years ago. He found out that readings that summer were taken under an empty beer crate at that location. At least the BOM had the good sense to invalidate the record.

Or the long-standing world record of 136 from Al-Azizyah, Libya taken under perverse conditions of overexposure and with no station in the region within 15 degrees of it for a high. WMO decertified it recently and the slightly less dubious 134 at Greenland Ranch, Death Valley, California is now the world record. Taking skin temp into consideration satellite data suggest remote parts of the Dasht-e-Lut (Lut Desert) in SE Iran approach 158 F...but this would be a near-surface temp rather than one taken at 2 meters AGL. It's possible that Dasht-e-Lut could beat out Death Valley if observational data were available.

 

This is similar to the satellite-derived surface temps at "Dome C" in Antarctica which were recorded to be around -140. It's known that "Dome C" is generally colder than Vostok though, however it hasn't beaten the -129 at Vostok yet for a 2 meter AGL temperature.

[Front Ranger]

It's hard for me to get into record summer cold. Especially in December.

 

Sure is a boring weather pattern right now.

[snow_wizard]

I think maybe they’re just making thermometers differently than they did 100 years ago. That is probably what all this hype about global warming is about... Faultily made thermometers.. I’d believe it...

I don't know. It's pretty hard to deny our winters are quite lame compared to what they used to be. I think it's mostly natural cycle though.

[wx_statman]

Or the long-standing world record of 136 from Al-Azizyah, Libya taken under perverse conditions of overexposure and with no station in the region within 15 degrees of it for a high. WMO decertified it recently and the slightly less dubious 134 at Greenland Ranch, Death Valley, California is now the world record. Taking skin temp into consideration satellite data suggest remote parts of the Dasht-e-Lut (Lut Desert) in SE Iran approach 158 F...but this would be a near-surface temp rather than one taken at 2 meters AGL. It's possible that Dasht-e-Lut could beat out Death Valley if observational data were available.

This is similar to the satellite-derived surface temps at "Dome C" in Antarctica which were recorded to be around -140. It's known that "Dome C" is generally colder than Vostok though, however it hasn't beaten the -129 at Vostok yet for a 2 meter AGL temperature.

Yeah the El Azizia record is another good one. I'm glad they finally scrubbed it. The 134 at Death Valley is totally bogus too. Reanalysis suggests a maximum of 120-121 that day. I remember Christopher Burt discussing that.

[chinook]

-

A check of my more simple rain gage setup here more south, shows 2 in. or so with this most recent past activity. 

 

— Certainly near, to normal leastwise I'd say.

 

Normal? ...water year? ...for the month?

[Deweydog]

It's hard for me to get into record summer cold. Especially in December.

 

Sure is a boring weather pattern right now.

Check the Euro!

[Phil]

You've lost me here again "Phil". I'm seeing no mention of a retrograde circumstance, more future tense above within this thread, previous to yours here.

 

— To which "the retrograde" are you referring. ?

The retrograde of the western ridge that will develop in the later portion of December..

 

I thought that was a pretty clear allusion..when do we ever speak of retrogrades here unless it involves the NE-Pacific ridge?

[TT-SEA]

00Z GFS for tomorrow (Sunday):

 

http://mag.ncep.noaa.gov/data/gfs/00/gfs_namer_024_precip_p06.gif

 

 

00Z GFS for next Sunday:

 

http://mag.ncep.noaa.gov/data/gfs/00/gfs_namer_192_precip_p06.gif

[wx_statman]

Its Saturday night in early December. I'm getting flashbacks to watching ASOS updates as the evening wears on. Watching those temperatures dropping lower at EUG, at RDM, at BNO. Getting excited.

 

Good times last year. Saturday 12/7/13.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Its Saturday night in early December. I'm getting flashbacks to watching ASOS updates as the evening wears on. Watching those temperatures dropping lower at EUG, at RDM, at BNO. Getting excited.

 

Good times last year. Saturday 12/7/13.

 

That was the night of my Christmas party. Unbelievable times. Got down to 2 IMBY

[Gradient Keeper]

Well, well, well, our long lost friend the Gorton's Fisherman has reviewed 00z models tonight and has given his thoughts. He is not very optimistic, but then again, when is he ever?

 

[wx_statman]

That was the night of my Christmas party. Unbelievable times. Got down to 2 IMBY

 

I had food poisoning that weekend. Spent Friday night making a mess. By Saturday evening I had recovered enough to watch ASOS sensors. That's all that mattered.

[snow_wizard]

FWIW more ensemble members get decently cold late in the run. Quite a few drop to -5 or -6.

[wx_statman]

No, we don't. ... But what should I be doing where and when I find the highly vague input that I have posted here by some people. Just let it pass and hope for better. ? .. Or mention the idea, and ask for clarification. ? Guide me. 

 

The back and forth is a bit much. You can question Phil all you like, you have that freedom. But I think you do it too often and perhaps not in the most effective of ways. The end result looks like clutter. Especially to people reading the thread later. I dunno.

[VancouverIslandSouth]

Not going to see much in the way of Arctic air anywhere but the far north anytime soon. The continental split flow shown at the end of the 0z ECMWF is a pretty classic Nino/+NAO pattern, more along the lines of what I'd expect to see in a strong Nino. The GFS seems to have backed away from any sort of amplified western ridging in the last few runs, end of the month still has potential if that turns out to be the case.

[IbrChris]

Yeah the El Azizia record is another good one. I'm glad they finally scrubbed it. The 134 at Death Valley is totally bogus too. Reanalysis suggests a maximum of 120-121 that day. I remember Christopher Burt discussing that.

My opinion is that the Badwater reading by a park ranger in June 1994 is probably the highest reputable reading in the world...131 degrees. Furnace Creek had 129 the same day at the official station but it's some bit higher in elevation versus Badwater.

[IbrChris]

But what should I be doing where and when I find the highly vague input that I have, posted here by some people. [...]

 

Guide me. You have my invitation and attention. 

 

— Face it, it's ridiculous to just to let some sh*t "pass". All I'm seeing where and when noting a more "casual" approach's having been attached to an idea more warranting a bit more substance, is "laziness". .... And again, all I do when I see it, is at times request a bit more clarity. This with some amount of more abstract suggestion of the idea more biting at times. But certainly generally within the lines of basic form. ...

 

"when I find the highly vague input that I have"

 

A bit of pot vs kettle wouldn't you say? I graduated with a 3.72 cumulative GPA with my meteorology degree, I also scored 97th percentile on the English portion of the GRE yet I can't make hide nor hair of most of what you write. I was concerned it was just me, then I joined a TheWeatherForums support group and others came to me in tears claiming they encountered the same incomprehensibility.

 

"But certainly generally within the lines of basic form."

 

Please note: comma-splicing is considered improper form when writing in English and remedying that would go a long way to the readability and comprehension of others with regard to what you are writing. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma_splice

 

 

"This with some amount of more abstract suggestion of the idea"

 

"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." --Albert Einstein.

 

KISS principle invoked here...in other words simplicity IS beauty, complexity and abstraction are not. The sign of intellect is being able to take a complex and often abstract idea and put it into layman's terms while still maintaining the veracity of the explanation. In other words keep it simple, this isn't a PhD dissertation or an online discussion between post-docs involved in quantum mechanics research. This is a forum largely of weather enthusiasts with little formal meteorological education aside from the handful of mets on here.

 

http://www.theenglishedition.com/wordpress/?p=285

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KISS_principle

 

No one is being lazy here, in my opinion, intellectually or otherwise (note the proper use of commas...I could remove "in my opinion" and the sentence still makes sense). It does no good to post a long and rather terse/abstract explanation about what you believe is going on in present and future weather patterns if other users simply skim past it because they cannot glean anything from it.

 

Don't take this post the wrong way but rather in the light of helpful suggestions for improvement.

 

Face it, it's ridiculous to just to let some sh*t "pass" - One man's schit is another man's treasure. Oh wait...

 

Disagreeing with someone doesn't mean you need to belittle their opinion. Point out their mistakes cogently if you are able, if not your rhetoric just displays your ignorance. You know the saying "Better to keep your mouth shut and be thought a fool than open it and remove all doubt."

 

Also try and avoid jumping right into a confrontational/accusatory stance when replying to people. This is very off-putting until and unless you've established that the OP had an intent to deceive (thus guilt). I highly doubt any user here intends to deceive people. Most of what is posted on this forum is subjective opinion, the only thing objective are the sources such as model runs, peer-reviewed studies and observational data.

[IbrChris]

The back and forth is a bit much. You can question Phil all you like, you have that freedom. But I think you do it too often and perhaps not in the most effective of ways. The end result looks like clutter. Especially to people reading the thread later. I dunno.

Questioning without contributing is problematic. I can question your declaration that the sky is blue, but if I offer no other feasible explanation and just say "the sky ISN'T blue" to me it's simply being contrarian for the sake of attention. Although it could be argued a lot of people on these forums are seeking attention perhaps out of boredom and/or lack of fulfillment in their lives. Sure a lot of us like to talk about meteorology and are quite knowledgeable on the subject but let's face it there's a lot of ego sabre-rattling and stroking that goes on here.

[MossMan]

We really need something to track.

[IbrChris]

Yeah the El Azizia record is another good one. I'm glad they finally scrubbed it. The 134 at Death Valley is totally bogus too. Reanalysis suggests a maximum of 120-121 that day. I remember Christopher Burt discussing that.

Supposedly a sand storm was in the vicinity at the time the reading was taken, implying strong winds as well. Unlikely you would have the extreme near-surface superadiabatic layer necessary to achieve a 130+ reading even at Death Valley in those conditions. It is posited that hot sand grains may have been driven by the wind into the thermometer casing thus helping to inflate the reading. I would guess it was a fairly typical summer day temperature-wise...which would be 115-118 given July normals, 120-125 if a stout ridge with high 500 mb heights is over the region.