WHAT IN TARNATION IS GOING ON...
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HOW HIGH DO WE FLY?
About the only question we face weatherwise this Christmas is just how high temperatures are going to fly? As it stands now the odds of readings in the 50s look extremely good. In fact, according to the GFS most of my region should end up in the mid to upper 50s, only the area north of HWY 20 is expected to hold in the low 50s.
These temperatures are about 25 degrees above normal, give or take a couple degrees.
The GFS ensembles show odds close to 100% that readings will be at least 20 degrees above average.
These are the odds of highs greater than 32 degrees. Notice a 100% chance the freezing line pushes all the way north to Lake Superior and southeast Canada. That takes some doing with the weak and limited amount of sunshine we see in late December.
For some perspective on the holiday warmth in my immediate area, I did a little digging and found the odds of reaching a high of 50 or more going back to the 1870s runs 3 to 7%. It's happened only 5 times in Dubuque in roughly 150 years of data. Obviously we will be pushing records but unless things really get out of hand, we'll probably end up 2-4 degrees short in most spots. Here's the records for some major cities in my area the next couple days. Great traveling weather for sure around tall of the Midwest this year!
WHAT IN TARNATION IS GOING ON?
Now for the bad news if you like winter and snow...yeah that's me. I showed in a post 3 days ago how we were lining up for much colder weather to start of the new year. My argument was centered around the MJO and the EPO (getting into colder phases) I had the MJO showing this. Rolling out of the warm phase of 6 into the colder ones of 7,8, and a bit of 1.
Here's the temperature analogs of what 7,8 and 1 bring for readings in late December early January.
The EPO was very supportive of such a change going from positive to negative phases by late December on both the GFS and EURO.
Well, models are nothing more than theoretical mathematics and sometimes they don't add up when the data is flawed. Now look at the latest MJO. It hightails it out of 7 and starts cutting back towards phase 5 or 6.
Here's the temperature analogs associate with phases 5 and 6. Ugh!
That leads me to the EPO. The projected negative phase in the mean of the EURO and GFS is never attined. That is a big change and a big bummer for me.
The EURO EPO