PNW October 2021, Pumpkin Spice Edition

[smerfylicious]

1 hour ago, Phil said:

I assume most of you guys have had your first freeze already?

I’m still waiting for a low below 40°.

My house got down to 29 last night. Short lived however. Its now 35.

[Kayla]

Been a very mild October here, just how I like to see it headed into winter!

26F here this morning even under a widespread stratus layer. Currently 27. Temps should fall into the teens this evening for the first time this year tonight as skies clear. Going to be chilly night for the kiddos!

[snow_wizard]

1 minute ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

Eugene will end October above average. SLE right about average. 

Pretty significant N to S gradient this month.  This last little shot of cold didn't even touch you guys.

[snow_wizard]

Just now, Kayla said:

Been a mild October here, just how I like to see it headed into winter!

26F here this morning even under a widespread stratus layer. Currently 27. Temps should fall into the teens this evening for the first time this year tonight as skies clear. Going to be chilly night for the kiddos!

We have to agree to disagree on whether a cold October is a good sign or not.  That having been said I have no problem with how this one ended up.  That's aside from the fact it ended up colder than normal here.

[Meatyorologist]

As is common on clear, still Autumn nights like this, my neighborhood cooled off much more significantly than the rest of the city. Currently sitting right at 33F after a low of 31F. Surrounding stations in the city are hovering around 36-42. The map above shows just how unusual (and fortunate) my location is.

This of course means this is the first freeze of the season at my place!  

Frost is much more thick than yesterday and on almost every surface. Bird bath is frozen solid, albeit only a half inch of it was left after emptying it.

[Timmy Supercell]

1 minute ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

October 2019 was legit cold. 

November had potential to be a third straight month in a row below average but wasn't in the cards I guess.

The last 3 Novembers here have had cold nights statistically, but all wasted in the end.

[TT-SEA]

7 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

Pretty significant N to S gradient this month.  This last little shot of cold didn't even touch you guys.

Andrew said that Salem and Eugene were close to normal... so were OLM and BLI and WFO SEA.     HQM is actually warmer than normal for October.    There really wasn't a N to S gradient at all.  

SEA seems to be the coldest station in the region since the new averages were released.    SEA being colder than normal is much less meaningful than it used to be since they moved the goal posts.  

[Kayla]

16 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

We have to agree to disagree on whether a cold October is a good sign or not.  That having been said I have no problem with how this one ended up.  That's aside from the fact it ended up colder than normal here.

It was barely cooler than normal out that way only because of the early to mid October onshore flow which really isn't that noteworthy. What was noteworthy was the massive AR event and jet suppression into Cali.

We saw no significant continental air masses this month which is a good thing IMO. The coldest Bozeman has been is 26 degrees this month compared to -10F last year. 

[Timmy Supercell]

lol that last week of Nov 2019 was legitimately the coldest November spell since 2010, but that month still came out +2.2 on the Mean temperature.

11/26 - 31/16
11/27 - 31/8
11/28 - 30/6
11/29 - 30/3
11/30 - 33/0
Half foot of snow on the ground 11/27 with the bomb low/blizzard event. Folks on Black Friday in near zero temps waiting to get their discounted socks and movies. 

[snow_wizard]

My theory on the Northern Lights bust is that the shock wave from the CME broke in half as it was headed toward us and ended up going around us on both sides.  I guess you could think of it as a splitting cold front.  The Kp never got even close to what was expected.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

Overall it was a pretty average month. Cool first half, mild wet 2nd half. 

[SilverFallsAndrew]

14 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Andrew said that Salem and Eugene were close to normal... so were OLM and BLI and WFO SEA.     HQM is actually warmer than normal for October.    There really wasn't a N to S gradient at all.  

SEA seems to be the coldest station in the region since the new averages were released.    SEA being colder than normal is much less meaningful than it used to be since they moved the goal posts.  

PDX will end up with like a -0.7 departure so below average, but essentially normal. 

[snow_wizard]

16 minutes ago, Meatyorologist said:

As is common on clear, still Autumn nights like this, my neighborhood cooled off much more significantly than the rest of the city. Currently sitting right at 33F after a low of 31F. Surrounding stations in the city are hovering around 36-42. The map above shows just how unusual (and fortunate) my location is.

This of course means this is the first freeze of the season at my place!  

Frost is much more thick than yesterday and on almost every surface. Bird bath is frozen solid, albeit only a half inch of it was left after emptying it.

That is lucky with you being so close to the water.  There are so many factors that go into a making a place a good frost pocket.

[snow_wizard]

16 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Andrew said that Salem and Eugene were close to normal... so were OLM and BLI and WFO SEA.     HQM is actually warmer than normal for October.    There really wasn't a N to S gradient at all.  

SEA seems to be the coldest station in the region since the new averages were released.    SEA being colder than normal is much less meaningful than it used to be since they moved the goal posts.  

It was colder than normal for my records also.

[TT-SEA]

3 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

PDX will end up with like a -0.7 departure so below average, but essentially normal. 

BLI  -0.2

WFO SEA  -0.6

OLM  -0.5

HQM  +0.5

 

Right in line EUG and SLE as well.   

Uniform departures across the entire region... SEA is the odd ball again on the cold side.

[snow_wizard]

16 minutes ago, Kayla said:

It was barely cooler than normal out that way only because of the early to mid October onshore flow which really isn't that noteworthy. What was noteworthy was the massive AR event and jet suppression into Cali.

We saw no significant continental air masses this month which is a good thing IMO. The coldest Bozeman has been is 26 degrees this month compared to -10F last year. 

The AR events is certainly one of the reasons I like how the month played out.  Also...the first half of the month was the coldest first half of October since 1990.  Not exactly no big deal.

As an aside I don't get your disdain for cold Octobers though.  The record is clear that cold Octobers with a Nina is a good sign.  At least if you're looking at Octobers in WA.

[Anti Marine Layer]

6 minutes ago, SilverFallsAndrew said:

PDX will end up with like a -0.7 departure so below average, but essentially normal. 

Not so much with a warning climate.

[snow_wizard]

9 minutes ago, hawkstwelve said:

Only dropped to 40 here. The wind held on till this morning but as soon as it stopped it dropped 8 degrees. 

It's pretty rare that east winds completely ruin the minimum temp for the day though.  Usually if one night is ruined the next will get cold before midnight.  In the case of last night it stopped soon enough to at least allow it to drop to around normal.

[Front Ranger]

33 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Andrew said that Salem and Eugene were close to normal... so were OLM and BLI and WFO SEA.     HQM is actually warmer than normal for October.    There really wasn't a N to S gradient at all.  

SEA seems to be the coldest station in the region since the new averages were released.    SEA being colder than normal is much less meaningful than it used to be since they moved the goal posts.  

And yet this logic was not often used when they were the "warmest" station in the region the past 10 years.

[Timmy Supercell]

21 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

My theory on the Northern Lights bust is that the shock wave from the CME broke in half as it was headed toward us and ended up going around us on both sides.  I guess you could think of it as a splitting cold front.  The Kp never got even close to what was expected.

Dutchsinse probably has an explanation on youtube somewhere lol

[Rubus Leucodermis]

1 hour ago, snow_wizard said:

I managed to drop to 36 last night in spite of being 52 after midnight.  Last night was one of the strangest east wind nights I've ever seen.  Places that were in the 30s early in the night ended up in the low 50s by sunrise while it was the exact opposite here.  Really goes to show how critical the gradient angle is with these things.

It was in the forties until 2:00 am here. Then the winds died and it quite rapidly dropped to the freezing mark. Currently 39˚F.

[TT-SEA]

10 minutes ago, Front Ranger said:

And yet this logic was not often used when they were the "warmest" station in the region the past 10 years.

Yeah... I recognized that the departure was probably 1 degree too warm in most months before the new averages   Now it seems to have flipped.     OLM is at -0.5 for October and SEA is at -1.9 which is by far the coldest major station in western WA and OR.

In September... SEA was -0.7 while OLM was +0.6

In August... SEA was +0.1 while OLM was +1.4

Nothing has really changed in terms of actual temperatures... but it is just completely opposite of what it was in terms of departures before the new averages were released.  People in the Seattle area can now pretend global cooling is happening.  

 

[Chewbacca Defense]

Got down to 31 last night, some frost but not as thick as yesterday.  Hoping the winds will die down a bit for my soccer game this afternoon.  Looks like we are trending in the right direction.

[Front Ranger]

4 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

Yeah... it was recognized that the departure was probably 1 degree too warm in most months.   Now it seems to have flipped.     OLM is at -0.5 for October and SEA is at -1.9 which is by far the coldest major station in western WA and OR.

In September... SEA was -0.7 while OLM was +0.6

In August... SEA was +0.1 while OLM was +1.4

Nothing has really changed in terms of actual temperatures... but it is just completely opposite of what it was before the new averages were released.  

 

My point was mainly that you spend a lot more time pointing out SEA's end of the spectrum now than you did then. 

For some reason. 

[TacomaWaWx]

I’ll have to check the stats when I get home tomorrow to see the actual departure from average but I’m guessing it was right at normal or maybe a half degree below…pretty close to all the stations in the Seattle area. A bit above average rainfall. 

[TT-SEA]

1 minute ago, Front Ranger said:

My point was mainly that you spend a lot more time pointing out SEA's end of the spectrum now than you did then. 

For some reason. 

And you spent more time pointing out OLM's colder departure... for some reason.    We both lost our narratives.  

[Kayla]

29 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

The AR events is certainly one of the reasons I like how the month played out.  Also...the first half of the month was the coldest first half of October since 1990.  Not exactly no big deal.

As an aside I don't get your disdain for cold Octobers though.  The record is clear that cold Octobers with a Nina is a good sign.  At least if you're looking at Octobers in WA.

I think that is where the problem lies. What happens in a very small part of the region and using that for large scale predictions is a mistake IMO. When I'm talking cold in October being a bad thing I'm speaking of historically cold continental air-masses dropping into the interior like the last two Octobers did, not some chilly onshore flow.

Clearly the jet suppression this month and a November torch is a much better indictor to how this winter may play out.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

12z is Super blah 

[Deweydog]

35 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

My theory on the Northern Lights bust is that the shock wave from the CME broke in half as it was headed toward us and ended up going around us on both sides.  I guess you could think of it as a splitting cold front.  The Kp never got even close to what was expected.

Sounds like plot of a bad Jerry Bruckheimer film.

[TacomaWaWx]

Thankfully the winds subsided yesterday evening here on the island. Yesterday was really breezy and pretty chilly for camping with all the wind. Going to be staying at west beach resort tonight so hopefully another good sunset. 

[MossMan]

Had a low of 33 but had heavier frost than yesterday’s 31. 

[TT-SEA]

10 minutes ago, Kayla said:

I think that is where the problem lies. What happens in a very small part of the region and using that for large scale predictions is a mistake IMO. When I'm talking cold in October being a bad thing I'm speaking of historically cold continental air-masses dropping into the interior like the last two Octobers did, not some chilly onshore flow.

Clearly the jet suppression this month and a November torch is a much better indictor to how this winter may play out.

This is spot on. 

[TT-SEA]

Already 55 in North Bend... there is some wind but its not too bad.  

[Timmy Supercell]

Sun is out again of course. 

[Phil]

48 minutes ago, snow_wizard said:

The AR events is certainly one of the reasons I like how the month played out.  Also...the first half of the month was the coldest first half of October since 1990.  Not exactly no big deal.

As an aside I don't get your disdain for cold Octobers though.  The record is clear that cold Octobers with a Nina is a good sign.  At least if you're looking at Octobers in WA.

This is false, though. You can continue repeating it, but it’s quantitatively debunkable.

Cold -ENSO winters actually follow warm Octobers just as frequently as they do cold Octobers. Literally the exact same return rate. This isn’t a question of opinion or belief. It’s numbers. It’s objective reality.

Yes, the pool of cold Octobers is larger because that is the favored outcome under -ENSO conditions. But a cold October is no more likely to precede a cold winter than a warm winter.

 

[High Desert Mat?]

5 minutes ago, Phil said:

This is false, though. You can continue repeating it, but it’s quantitatively debunkable.

Cold -ENSO winters actually follow warm Octobers just as frequently as they do cold Octobers. Literally the exact same return rate. This isn’t a question of opinion or belief. It’s numbers. It’s objective reality.

Yes, the pool of cold Octobers is larger because that is the favored outcome under -ENSO conditions. But a cold October is no more likely to precede a cold winter than a warm winter.

 

What about neutral Octobers though?

[Phil]

Just now, High Desert Mat? said:

What about neutral Octobers though?

I haven’t looked at that but I don’t see why the conclusion should be any different.

Our memories are inherently flawed and pieced together with confirmation bias. I find myself falling victim to it all the time.

[SilverFallsAndrew]

What about an October with average temps and precip?! 

[TacomaWaWx]

The warm November analog seems to be the only real winter indicator around here in the fall. All the September and October indicators don’t seem to really mean much either way. 

[Front Ranger]

38 minutes ago, TT-SEA said:

And you spent more time pointing out OLM's colder departure... for some reason.    We both lost our narratives.  

The difference is that nothing has changed to influence OLM's departures. I prefer them because of that, not because of the anomalies.