Insane Southern Jet Stream

[Warren Faidley]

I don't recall a time when the southern jet stream has been so energized in late December. Looking at the GFS, the wild swings are really entertaining, although they may not pan out. Crazy. It will be an interesting winter and spring **somewhere** if this keeps up.

W.

 

[Greg McLaughlin]

It must be global warming.

 

[Jason Boggs]

I agree! El Nino is really starting to get going around here. I hope we get some snow very soon! Then by spring, hopefully it will still be in full swing for some good dynamics for severe wx.

 

[Chad Cowan]

The southern branch of the jet stream has been phasing with the polar jet quite often as of late, this is resulting in some supercharged jet stream speeds (200+ kts at 250mb tomorrow!). The southern stream's strength and positioning is in line with a strong El Nino, and this doesn't look to change anytime soon. This pattern of persistent and deep east coast troughing punctuated by progressive systems moving across the Plains has been in place for months and months (since mid-summer, IIRC). I'm not sure that this tendency will lend itself towards a record breaking 2010 tornado season for the Plains.

 

[Wesley Luginbyhl]

I remember during the 06/07 winter that every few weeks a powerful storm would dig into the South Plains with big ice storms for OK. We had multiple ice storms there in Norman, OK that winter. I saw lightning during 2 ice storms. They were very dynamic systems. Overall they were alot like what has been happening recently.

I told everyone I knew that year if that kept up until spring that it would be a good year (turned out to be my best with nearly 30 tornadoes). There were tornadoes in Feb in the TX Panhandle (I missed those), but caught an EF-4 wedge is SE KS in Feb to start the year off. I remember getting 6 tornado days out of 9 chase days at one point in 2007. That will spoil you. Lets hope the current trend keeps up. I could really use another 2007 season right now.

I couldn't find a better chart, but the 07 ENSO cycle looks similiar to whats going on now on the 1st chart on this page. If anyone knows where a better graph is, please post it.

 

[Jason Foster]

Yeah Warren, I didn't even think about you guys out west even watching it, but the jet certainly played a part into the historic snow event we had here (in Washington, DC) yesterday. I just got 20" at the house in a month were we are likely only to see a few inches if any. Apparently the NAM picked up well on the jet and other facts and did well with this storm. I can't say I knew that myself, but the mets certainly are talking about that a bit.

 

[cdcollura]

Good day all,

Definitely El Niño. Global warming, not.

Funny you mentioned as when I was skydiving this past weekend the plane, flying at 80 Knots when we jumped, was nearly still over the ground at 14,000 feet (I guess the mid level flow was strong too)! Interesting looking down before jumping and seeing the ground almost NOT moving ;-)

For storm chasing ... This is NOT a good pattern, despite seeing these insane jet stream patterns, come Spring and Summer 2010. El Niño years often cause the death ridges in May (after storms in the non-standard chase areas father south earlier), and - ofcourse - Horrible hurricane chasing prospects due to the shear.

I am not in the mood for a repeat of '09 ... No way.

For folks in these "non standard" chase areas, however, this can be a good thing. Tornadoes tend to develop more in the deep south / Florida during El Niño years, so this jet stream can be something to watch most of the winter (just make sure you dodge all the grunge any violent HP supercell may be embedded in). Southern / Central California can also get very interesting wet weather.