RSS sped out their temperature anomaly reporting 0.546 for April, 2010. This dropped more than 0.1C from March’s anomaly of 0.652C. It’s the second highest April anomaly since 1998 when the RSS anomaly hit its all time record high of 0.858C.
Still waiting for Roy to report UAH so we can figure out who won this month’s quatloos. I’m hoping we’ll be able to read those value sometime today or tomorrow.
Look for the monthly values to continue to come crashing down. The latest weekly Nino3.4 values were at the El Nino threshold conditions on their way down. The Upper Ocean Heat Content anomalies for all Nino regions has turned negative. See:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf
Fred, I wouldn’t expect the anomalies to come crashing down. The heat that entered the atmosphere through the El Nino period doesn’t disappaer instantaneously. Typically, there is something like a 3-6 month lag between Nino and surface temperature. I think the lag might be somewhat longer for the lower troposphere. And following the daily tracking, we are in the midst of a bit of an up-tick, so I wouldn’t expect May to come all that much lower than April.
Sea surface temperature maps suggest continued high anomalies, even with a weakening Nino. Perhaps you can think of these high surface temperatures as partly a lagged effect of the Nino oscillation.
But, no doubt it does seem quite evident that the Nino is about to end, and a good probability we will be in Nina territory by the end of the year, along with somewhat cooler global surface temperatures. Also, lower troposphere temperatures tend to be more sensitive to nino events.
Todd, Fred– It does look like we are nearing the end of El Nino. I don’t expect temperature to plunge, but they will probably drop over the next few months. Still, predicting is hard, especially about the future.
My friend Quinn sent this from Alberta, Canada today.
This is what his yard looks like right now.
http://i42.tinypic.com/j155pv.jpg
Lucia,
“Predicting is hard, especially about the future”
.
Bohr and Berra; what better company can you keep?
Typical behaviour following an El Nino is for global temperature to peak in January and drop gradually through the first half of the year, and then following the next ENSO phase late in the year. 2010 joins 1998 in having the peak sustained and even increased past January. The other exception to a January peak is 87/88 which peaked in December.
I expect that the temperature response this year will be towards the cooler end of what is typical for an El Nino as ENSO appears to be entering a cool phase. Also assuming an underlying Co2 warming trend of 0.18 degrees/decade, I believe a drop to between 0.1 and 0.4 degrees can be expected by the end of this year for RSS.
Lucia, We’re not nearing the end, it’s over. It will take a while for the end of the El Nino to show up on the monthly and ONI averages.
Heat anoms in the 3.4 are below 0.5 and there is no sign that the fall will slow down for a while. It also looks like there will be a transition into a pretty good La Nina too.
I ask my 70 year old bones: what will the summer be like?
my bones say: was the winter mild?
In Greece, yes.
my bones say: then you are in for another naturally air conditioned summer
Greece is allowed Delta energy for the year. Got it in winter? lose it in summer.
Not bad :).
Liza, did Alberta have a milder winter than normal?
Seriously though, all this ash in the northern hemisphere will also do its bit .
As the French say: Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose
the more it changes the more it is the same.
Very apt for the climate.
“Predicting is hard, especially about the futureâ€
Niels Bohr said that but although the sentence is Danish “Det er svært at spÃ¥, især om fremtiden” it was probably said originally by a Danish parliamentarian in the years between 1935-1939.
2nd warmest April, you don’t say…
In the meantime: “Snowfall in Southern France”
http://www.weatheronline.co.uk/cgi-app/reports?ARCHIV=0&LANG=fr&MENU=207&FILE=ur.txt&DAY=20100505
anna v (Comment#41952) May 5th, 2010 at 12:04 am
I will ask my friend that question about Alberta.
I am in California. Are you really in Greece? My grandfather, my mom’s father, was from Corinth. I long to travel there some day. 🙂
UAH is posted for April at +0.50 C
See CFS SST forecasts here:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/images3/glbSSTMon.gif
And the ECMWF SST forecast here:
http://www.ecmwf.int/products/forecasts/d/charts/seasonal/forecast/seasonal_range_forecast/group_public/seasonal_charts_public_sst!2m%20temperature!1%20month!Tropics!201004!tercile%20summary/
They are showing La Nina type conditions by the summer time which, even with 3-6 month lag on atmospheric temperatures, we will be very cool in 2010.
Re: liza (May 5 07:20),
Hi Liza. Yes, I am Greek and live in Greece. I spend half my time across the gulf from Corinth. I can see its lights at night. 🙂
Southern California has the same climate more or less.
anna v (Comment#41975) May 5th, 2010 at 12:00 pm
Hi anna!
That’s what my mom said when she got to travel there;”feels like California weather!”. My husband wants to stand at Thermopylae. which is sort of fun saying here; since it is a blog about “hot” temperatures. 🙂
To continue my anecdotal weather observations:
The swallows were late in coming. I just saw a pair last week. This means either that our particular swarms were drowned in a storm at sea crossing from Egypt, or that they somehow know that it is/would be too dry for the insects that they need to feed a nest and have by passed us. It has not rained for over a month and there are few insects in the air.
Some of the beech trees in the yard of our apartment complex had a small bloom and were very late in leaves. They are just now leafing, instead of March.
The large male pistachio tree in my cottage is just now blooming and I am keeping my fingers crossed it is not sick. Should have bloomed about a month ago.
So, something wrong with clocks of fauna and flora. Maybe it is something electromagnetic. The winter rains ( there were enough and satisfactory, the olive crop is blooming well) had little electric energy, meager thunderstorms.
That is the way omens were studied, some time ago.
I’m sure swallows can be used as proxy for the next generation climate models?
I regularly hike in the neighbour dune area (West of the Netherlands) and see many trees don’t have even leaves while it’s already 1st week of May. The season must have a delayed start of at least 4-6 weeks.