VAAAAAAAANNNNNCOOOOOUVER

Weird how the world works. We'd probably share a beer or two over this.

I’m speaking strictly in regards to climate/global temps, not our backyards or personal preferences. That local/regional stuff is always subject to chaos anyways, our greatest winter in history occurred during a -PDO/-PMM stretch. And the PNW has similar examples like 1942/43. Also the sobering reality is the variability in ocean-atmosphere general circulation that is associated with changes in ENSO tendencies is a multidecadal to multi-century scale phenomenon. The enhanced state baseline (tendency towards multiyear Niñas and less frequent Niños) has been a general constant since the 1800s, when the LIA began to recede. It has been at work a *long* time, warming the system since before the Industrial Revolution. If it reversed now, we probably wouldn’t notice substantial changes until we’re in retirement homes decades from now, because the initial result would be a temperature spike as oceanic heat is expelled. The general multidecadal cooling would then occur from that high point. The sad consequence of decades to centuries of unfavorable general circulation with some AGW/GHG warming thrown on top post-WWII as icing on the cake.

Global temps peaked in 1998 in that stretch. They didn't cleanly surpass 1998 levels until 2005, well after the demise of the Niña event. 1999 and 2000 were each about 0.2C colder globally than 1998, though still slightly warmer than 1996. The only significant Niño year in the last 50 years that has coincided with a colder global temperature anomaly was 1992, and that was probably entirely due to Pinatubo.

I think the excess death tally from the 2021 event was around 1400.