Slap Your Face, Pick Your Pocket Cold and Snow
If what’s coming in the next 15 days is followed by what we at WeatherBELL believe will be a cold January for the United States, it will mean the late fall/winter periods of three of the last five winter seasons will have been colder than normal in much of the nation. The non-winter of ‘11-‘12 is sticking out like a soar thumb when one considers the pick your pocket energy-wise, slap your face temperature-wise cold and snow of the mid and late winter last season well into what was a cold spring. By the way, cold springs are quite common when the Pacific is in its cooling phase (we call this a cold PDO [Pacific Decadal Oscillation]) and the Atlantic is in its warm phase (called a warm AMO [Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation]). Therefore, the warm spring of 2012 is not likely to be repeated anytime soon.
The recent cold snap (the month of November was the coldest November since 1996) set over 1000 cold records.
If what’s coming in the next 15 days is followed by what we at WeatherBELL believe will be a cold January for the United States, it will mean the late fall/winter periods of three of the last five winter seasons will have been colder than normal in much of the nation. The non-winter of ‘11-'12 is sticking out like a soar thumb when one considers the pick your pocket energy-wise, slap your face temperature-wise cold and snow of the mid and late winter last season well into what was a cold spring. By the way, cold springs are quite common when the Pacific is in its cooling phase (we call this a cold PDO [Pacific Decadal Oscillation]) and the Atlantic is in its warm phase (called a warm AMO [Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation]). Therefore, the warm spring of 2012 is not likely to be repeated anytime soon.
While all this is directly correlated and can be seen in predictable natural events (four years ago I was showing how the winters of '12-'13 and '13-'14 could be quite cold based on a theory I picked up from some meteorologists I know down in Houston), to me, it’s not a sign that catastrophic global cooling – a return to the Little Ice Age given the expectations of society today – is on the way. Nor would I point to something like this as a sign of impending doom, even if I want to make my point about the cooling I believe is already underway (the data shows it). My forecast is that by 2030, global temperatures are back where they were in 1978, the start of the satellite era. This is based on the reversal of the Pacific oscillation which has already started, followed by the Atlantic, beginning around 2020. To me, it’s simply part of a natural cycle that, only since 1978, can we really observe objectively by satellite. Consequently, one of the more devious things being done now is a downward adjustment to temperatures in the pre-satellite era to make it look warmer. There has been much written on this, and I have linked to some of the articles before explaining what’s going on there, so I won’t go any further. But here is where one can see the hypocrisy of the other side: They make so much of an individual extreme event they believe bolsters their case, but ignore events of equal or greater magnitude that argue the opposite; or, they claim the opposite of what they are saying is a sign what they are saying is right.
With early cold already blasting Europe, the Far East about to get cold, and now the American market getting off to a cold start to winter for the third time in the last five years (keep in mind the Pacific flipped to its cold phase about 5 years ago), perhaps it will awaken the public and media drones – not to a coming ice age, but that the weather does run in cycles and what goes up, will eventually come down. Hopefully the Little Ice Age theory being pushed by some solar scientists will not come to pass, as given what the EPA is doing in the name of global warming, our nation will be essentially helpless to progress economically in colder times (the way they are going, even if it’s warmer). By destroying the energy lifeline of the nation, there is a cap on what our economy can do.
In any case, last January right before winter turned, I warned viewers on Fox Business that the season was going to slap your face and pick your pocket. The same thing is about to happen. (The cold that came caught energy markets by surprise, forcing a $1 rise in natural gas. It’s already close to 40 cents as this market plays catch up.) Whether we are right about January is up for argument, as all future events are, but the coming couple of weeks are going to be a heck of a way to run a global warm up.
By the way, it’s darn cold in Europe and about to get cold in the Far East too. So major population centers are about to get hit again. As far as people worried about Arctic “warming” and the sea ice fading away, the Arctic sea ice extent is nearing the 1979-2000 average.
The Southern Hemisphere ice continues to break record daily highs.
The global warming alarmists are skating on thin ice.
Joe Bastardi is chief forecaster at WeatherBELL Analytics, a meteorological consulting firm.
