The main purpose of this ongoing blog will be to track planetary extreme, or record temperatures related to climate change. Any reports I see of ETs will be listed below the main topic of the day. I’ll refer to extreme or record temperatures as ETs (not extraterrestrials).😉
Main Topic: U.S. Average Temperature Spring Forecast (It Will Be Very Warm.)
Dear Diary. It is now the start of meteorological spring, so once again as we do on this blog, it is time to make a forecast for this season. Winter 2023/24 had mild temperatures overall across the lower 48 states and in fact will be pegged as the warmest since records have been kept since 1895. I think that we will see this warmth continue into this spring due to a combination of climate change and a strong El Niño pumping added warmth into the global atmosphere, although I doubt that we will see the warmest spring on record. Nevertheless, no matter how far above average this spring will be overall, there will be periods of cooler than average conditions for localized areas of the country.
At the very start of spring, it’s time for me to make another attempt at a forecast for average seasonal temperatures in the U.S. This forecast will be very broad and not specific for any one state comprising the continental United States (or lower 48 states).
So how did the forecast work out for Winter 2023\24? Here is a link to the post for that forecast:
By March 8th the National Center for Environmental Information will finish their climatological assessment for Winter 2023\24, so our verification is not complete as of March 2nd. Let’s do fill in ranking numbers with 1 being the coldest and 129 warmest for a verification for months during 2024, which have already been assessed (128 would be warmest for 2023.):
Here are my two cents for a broad, rough forecast for the U.S. for Spring 2024, which I guarantee to be warmer than this past winter, of course, as the amount of daylight increases across the Northern Hemisphere. First, I like to look at water temperature anomalies surrounding North America just before the start of a season to get a sense of how much potential anomalous heat can be added to the atmosphere across the continent. Here is what we see:
The entire continent of North America is surrounded by above average temperature waters. The current El Niño has peaked and will start to wane moving through this spring. Frankly, I don’t see any good reason why the U.S. will have a bellow average spring looking at sea surface temperatures. It should be quite mild unless we get an unusual jet stream pattern sometime later during the season.
Speaking of upper air patterns and the jet stream, looking at ensembles, it should be mild across most of the lower 48 states through the middle of March except for the West. The West will continue to see below average temperatures with lots of unsettled weather that will fill reservoirs, thank goodness:
Here is the National Weather Service forecast for Spring 2024:
I can’t disagree at all with the NOAA forecast. The above two charts are typical forecasts during an El Niño regime, which would meteorologically have a split jet flow such that storm systems would affect mostly the southern U.S. The northern branch of the jet would have a tendency of staying north of the CONUS, so there would not be as many cold air intrusions from Canada as usual. If you compound El Niño with climate change, this spring should be extra warm…unless southern storms are extra cold going well into April and May.
Next, we can get another clue looking at prior National Center for Environmental Information ranking and temperature record count data. For this I like to drag out my “Record Scoreboard” (updated through 2/28/2024):
For these data sets all monthly ratios of > 10 to 1 DHMX to DLMN or > 10 to 1 DLMN to DHMX are in bold type. The rankings are for the lower 48 states with the warmest ranking since 1895 of average temperatures being 129 and 1 being the coldest as of 2024. Blue colors represent cold months and red warm. Those months and years with counts close to a 1 to 1 ratio of highs to lows are colored black. Boldly red-, blue-, or purple-colored months, such as January 2020 and June 2021, have ratios of >10 to 1 daily record highs to lows or <1 to 10 daily record highs to lows, and are either historically hot or cold, most of which have made news. All-time record hot or cold ranked months are highlighted in purple. I’ve subtracted Alaska records so we can better compare apples to apples with record totals and rankings for the lower 48 states.
Notice that both December 2023 and February 2024 had a better that 10-1 ratio of DHMX to DLMN record reports. Sandwiched in between December and February was a much colder January, but it wasn’t cold enough to keep winter from likely being pegged the warmest in U.S. history. I’m thinking that the period from March through May 2024 will see warm ratios with the slight possibility of either April or May to have a better than 10-1 ratio of DHMX to DLMN record reports. Looking at daily record ratios by month we are “due” for a warm spring:
I’m predicting that all three months of Spring 2024 will be above average with March being the most likely month to see temperatures closer to average and May the warmest. Here is the link to avg. rankings per year for the lower 48 states since 1895:
https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/cag/national/rankings
Not all seasons in the near future will see above average temperatures, but seasonal forecasters are beginning to “chuck it,” discounting colder than average scenarios due to carbon pollution.
Here are all seasons ranked for the last decade:
The last time we had a slightly below average spring season was in 2019. An average ranking on the above chart would be 64 as of 2023.
Here is my bottom-line forecast for Spring 2024:
“I think that this winter will be ranked well above average. I’m going to forecast that the Spring 2024 ranking will be around 110 + or – 10, with above average confidence given all of the factors written within this post.“
My forecast for Fall 2023 of a ranking of 110 was 14 rankings too cool, but not too bad:
We will see how well my forecast ranking of near 110 for Winter 2023/24 worked out in a few days.
As of 2024 the top ranking for any month or season would be 129 since climatological rankings for the United States started in the year 1895. Carbon pollution is definitely making below average seasons rarer. As stated, I’m going to guess that Spring 2023 gets ranked around 110 + or – 10, and with above average confidence given all of the factors in this post. Have a fantastic spring but be weather aware for any severe storms.
Here are more “ET’s” recorded from around the planet the last couple of days, their consequences, and some extreme temperature outlooks, as well as any extreme precipitation reports:
Here is some brand-new February 2024:
Here is More Climate News from Saturday:
(As usual, this will be a fluid post in which more information gets added during the day as it crosses my radar, crediting all who have put it on-line. Items will be archived on this site for posterity. In most instances click on the pictures of each tweet to see each article. The most noteworthy items will be listed first.)