UKC

How long will the UK be in the grip of cold winters? David Dobson from the Earth Sciences Department at University College London gives us some answers.

Read more at http://www.ukclimbing.com/news/item.php?id=59491

In reply to UKC News: There is more recent NAO data at http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/~timo/datapages/naoi.htm . It includes data for last winter - the lowest NAO for 190 years! It would be interesting to map this against the more recent Braemar data....

In reply to leathers:

There was an article about this on Radio 4's The Material World a few weeks ago. It said given the strength of the conditions causing last years cold spell (The Azores High was involved as well) that if it weren't for the effect of global warming, it would have been colder still.

In reply to pec: I can remember somebody posting last winter about the NAO and that it had 'flipped' or something. they were saying we could be in for a decade or so of these kind of winters. Looks like they may have been on to something.

In reply to Jack:

Christ, does that mean were gonna have even more bloody pictures of winter climbing in the gallery?

In reply to Jack:

Probably referring to the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). This is a mode of N. Atlantic sea surface temperature variability that is thought to be related to northward ocean heat transport; for the past decade or so it's been positive (i.e. relatively warm N. Atlantic) but in 2009 it started shifting to it's negative phase.

That could def. influence the NAO state on decadal time scales (as could, say, having extremely reduced summer sea ice cover in the Arctic).

In reply to UKC News:

Given that these data monkeys can't tell me what's happening tomorrow with any reliability, I'll take all that with a large pinch of salt.

Barbeque summer anyone?

In reply to JJL:

I agree

In reply to a13x:

Yeah but he's only talking about winter weather patterns ...summers can still be hot.

He wrote into Summit mag last winter predicting this winter's weather - so he's on the money so far - just 4 more to go!

In reply to Jack:


In reply to Jack:

That was me. I picked up on an article in New Scientist and did a blog post on the topic. It's interesting that media 'experts' have only just started mentioning the North Atlantic Oscillation now, when we're already well into the second of the 10-20 hard winters I predicted last year.

http://gavinmacfie.blogspot.com/2009/10/is-rennaisance-of-winter-climbing.h...

In reply to Pylon King:

Let's hope so!

In reply to JJL: Exactly what I thought. One minute saying Global Warming is "definitely" happening, next saying we're having an ice age. Its the arrogance that bothers me.

In reply to waj:

it is

and we're not

the arrogance is only in your head.

In reply to Gav M:

wait a minute - there's 10-20 more years of this in store? Oh lord.

In reply to JJL:


You what? Short term forecasts these days are exceptionally reliable, for most places in the UK at least. Try to recall the last time you looked at a forecast and it was wrong to an appreciable degree.


In reply to waj: You are aware that the word 'global', as in 'global warming', refers to things happening worldwide, not just in the UK?

In reply to UKC News: Interestingly, a similar phenomenon appears to be affecting Australia. THere may be a ten-year cycle in the Pacific oscillation with the infamous el-Nino system dominating alternate decades with the less well-known la-Nina system. We appear to have shifted into a la-Nina dominated spell with massive rainfall all across the eastern side of the continent for the last two summers - particularly the last few months - after a drought that stretched back well into the 90s. There is possibly a link between the North Atlantic and SOuth Pacific systems but I believe it has not really been pinned down as yet.

In reply to Byronius Maximus:


Please don't try and confuse the issue with your 'facts', 'data' and 'physics', produced by scientists who spend their careers studying this stuff. Those smokescreens are no match for the penetrating insight of JJL and waj.

In reply to Dave C:

Dave

The new thinking is that the current Big Dry in Australia has more to do with the Indian Ocean dipole than with ENSO.

In reply to Byronius Maximus:

Um, yesterday?

This bit of the Chilterns seems tricky - we had no snow recently (although we finally got some on Saturday) when the rest of the country had lots. It's particularly unreliable if the weather comes in from the rest - it can be snowing hard in Beaconsfield and dry here (<10 miles east).

There's a weatherman who's a parent at my son's school. He ruefully told me once that the most accurate forecast of tomorrow's weather is to assume it will be like today's. Apparently predicting the changes is where it's hard.

As for long-range stuff, the barbeque summer wasn't really and the last winter was originally forecast to be mild.

Oh, and for clarity, I'm right on board with the global warming thing and don't believe that a couple of cold winters are any sort of counter.

In reply to JJL:

Fair enough. To be honest I find the forecasts very reliable and can't recall the last time I was really let down by it.


Lol, this is what I grew up being told by my Dad and I'm coming to realise that he's right! You just assume that it will be wrong every once in a while.



I didn't think you weren't on board with it That other comment was in reply to waj.

In reply to Captain Fastrousers:


What big dry? That ended 18 months ago with no change to the Indian Ocean dipole, which may explain why parts of southern W.A. are still in drought. We are now into our second successive La Nina and this one is huge. There's barely a river or creek in the eastern half of the continent that hasn't flooded at least once this year. You are right about some current thinking leaning towards the I.O. dipole being the major influence but the current deluge is causing yet another re-think!

In reply to Dave C:

I did not know that; my knowledge is based on current published research, which of course is typically 12-18 months out of date.

Although, in the last 18 months ENSO has seen a mild El Nino phase as well as the current La Nina, no?.

If suppose if anyone really knew what was going on, CSIRO wouldn't be hiring climatologists like mad at the moment.

In reply to Captain Fastrousers:

I think the last el nino in 2009-2010 was actually the strongest Modoki el nino on record. It seems to be a different version than the standard El nino. This El nina looks like the strongest on record.

I am only interested in these things becasuse of surf. But some knowledgeable surfers/climatologists from scripps told me that there is quite a lot of uncertainty about El nina/El nino. I am sure the strongest el nina on record is related to the cold in europe - somehow!

In reply to wilding:


Even here in Southern California, a good bit closer to the tropical Pacific than the UK, the effects of ENSO don't really kick in until early January. The current extreme weather in Southern California is actually the 'reverse' of what would be expected from a La Nina.

I'd be willing to wager that the winter that western Europe has experienced so far this year has almost nothing to do with La Nina, and an awful lot to do with the weak NAO.