Apologies if I have missed it, but we don't have a Winter thoughts thread yet, hope mods don't mind.

Anyway, some thoughts I have just read:

http://www.weatherweb.net/wxwebtvsimonnew.php?ID=829

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Add to that output from the CFS whic is suggesting a late onset to winter, probably not until later Decemeber, But then cold through January, February and March 2014, and the signs are not especially encouraging.

There are enough errors in the punctuation and spelling above for me to treat this with the seriousness it deserves.

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LOL Steve, don't hold back now!!

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Conversely Roger J Smith thinks mild;

http://www.gavsweathervids.com/rogerjsmith.html

(second post in the table)

Personally I've not really started thinking about winter 13/14 yet, though my NAO forecast based on May's SST's did suggest a negative NAO was likely again.

For a long time 2013 seemed to be running very closely to 1962, but we deviated from that in July.

Solar activity remains  way, way below what you would normally expect in a typical solar maximum, so even if we do end up mild overall, I suspect we'll still have some cold/snowy snaps to  deal with...

I'll start turning my mind to it much more seriously in September. 

 

 

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Hi Rich.

LRf's are a complete waste of time, effort and energy. Many self respecting forecasters who do OK with short to mid term predictions eventually come massively unstuck, complete with reputation dented, when they try to do these silly forecasts.

IMO...of course.

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I know exactly what you mean Steve of course, hence why the Met gave up doing theirs  Interesting nonetheless to see what others think though.

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The Met still do long range forecast's, they just don't make them public.

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Good thread Rich, nice to see some chat about Winter

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I'm sure I saw somewhere that Roger uses solar data in his forecasts - perhaps this fact I read elsewhere is one of the reasons.

She further noted that in the eQBO years stratospheric sudden warmings (SSWs) occur during all stages of the solar cycle, but that in the wQBO years no SSWs were found when the sunspot number was below 110.

Of course, we can have a cold winter without one of these events but the positive QBO might be a spanner in the works.

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JAS3883.1

 

Interesting. Given that QBO phases seem to last somewhere around 14 months, you would expect us to be in positive territory (ie, wQBO) during winter 2013/14. But some say that the QBO is weakening significantly and could be in negative territory come winter:

http://theweathercentre.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/positive-qbo-may-not-survive-into-winter.html

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Met O Seasonal forecasts are available on their website, too soon for the 3 monthly winter forecast yet of course.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/publicsector/contingency-planners

Don't we normally have an autumn thoughts thread first? 😂

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It's still Summer.  

Joking aside, this can't really be about prospects for two seasons away. What it will be is either a thread about what people want, or just a changing daily prospects as the CFS etc change, which they ultimately will.

Doesn't mean the thread isn't valid and shouldn't be here, but I do wonder what the actual point of these musings is, be it winter or summer, as we haven't got the foggiest 😛

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For two more days 

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Discussing the validity of this in admin. Some members don't like ramping or otherwise, especially 3 or 4 months out from the season in question. May lock this til November or may just leave it open. Will update later

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We can pretend we do 

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Indeed 😂

Maybe we should open a fiction forum for discussing LRFs two seasons out. We could combine it with the climate forum 👅

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Winter prospects: the days are short the nights are long, it will get colder and there will be snow at some point. 

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About as realistic as anyone can be 😂

I can imagine the furore if a summer thread appeared in January

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I really think we will all be disapointed with this winter.  CAnt help but think we were spoiled by what we got last time around.  Be it very late in the season.

 

I think it will be a few years before we get one that comes close to 2012-13 again.

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I don't take much notice of winter until November.

And yes Autumn first.

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Can the thread stay please - I bet it will be the busiest on the forum. By all means rename it to something like 'a look ahead' but don't just lock because it offends the sensibilities of a few.

Sorry. Will reopen this in November.

Pointless discussing the weather three or four months away. We don't know what's going to happen two weeks away and there would be plenty of dissenting voices if sometime tried to start discussing summer in January.

In the meantime there's an autumn thread further up the page. 😄

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