Cold wave over Europe

[Pierre]

While the PTB meet in Cancun tourist resort to impose a global tax on CO2 emissions (allegedly to fight against global warming), ironically Europe is going through an historic cold wave.

Here are a few temperature records :

-8°C in Netherlands
-15.4°C in Orleans, France (plain)
-10°C in Huesca, Spain (492 m high)
-22°C in Mouthe, France (935 m high)
-30.4°C in La Brévine, Switzerland (1040 m high)

Most of those temperatures were recorded on November 30th, knowing that for meteorologists winter starts on the 1st of December (an not during the solstice on the 21st of December)

So, technically these are autumn temperatures, exceptionally low ones.

In addition to those record low temperatures, massive snow falls were recorded over Europe. From 30 to 60 cm in the plains of Central France for example.

And now a little quiz. Where and when was this picture taken?

A cozy little Siberian farm in the middle of winter?
Canada getting ready to celebrate New Year Eve?

None at all.

It's a house in Saint Pol de Leon, France. Saint Pol altitude is an astounding 28 meters (prepare your oxygen mask) and is located in Britanny, a Northwestern French region along the Atlantic coast.

Britanny is famous for its very mild temperatures and its rare snow because of the heavy influence of the jet stream (that brings wet and hot air from above the Atlantic ocean and push away the cold continental air) and the Gulf stream that brings hot water to the Britanny coasts.

The only problems is that the Jet stream has been severely disrupted : a few days ago it was almost nonexistent above the Atlantic ocean and around European longitude it blew above Northern Africa instead of Northern Europe (such a Southern path had never been witnessed according to meteorologists). In addition the Gulf stream is getting weaker (average temperature and flows are lower than usual).

The result for Britain is striking : -6°C in the middle of the day and 30 cm of snow (1 foot).

According to weather forecasts, over the next days weather in Europe should get worse...

Please give us back our global warming.

 

[Keit]

Britain is famous for its very mild temperatures and its absence of snow because of the heavy influence of the jet stream (that brings wet and hot air from above the Atlantic ocean and push away the cold continental air) and the Gulf stream that brings hot water to the Britain coasts.

The only problems is that the Jet stream has been severely disrupted : a few days ago it was almost nonexistent above the Atlantic ocean and around European longitude it blew above Northern Africa instead of Northern Europe (such a Southern path had never been witnessed according to meteorologists). In addition the Gulf stream is getting weaker (average temperature and flows are lower than usual).

Here is an article about this "jet steam blocking" event.

_http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/1130/1224284431435.html

Many years of cold winters lie ahead

WE ARE likely to experience several years of colder winters with more frequent cold spells similar to the current conditions, according to a UK climate expert.

The change comes as a result of a link between the sun and the high altitude jet stream winds, explained Prof Mike Lockwood of the department of meteorology at the University of Reading.

He and colleagues have established a link between low solar activity and a phenomenon known as “jet stream blocking”.

It causes a change in the normal weather patterns, keeping warmer Atlantic air away and instead channelling frigid Arctic and Siberian air across western Europe, including Ireland, he said.

“It looked last week like we had a blocking event formed,” he said. “The phenomenon is really a snaking of the jet stream. It can start to pull lower altitude, cold Russian air back in over Europe.”

Solar activity in this case does not mean heat or light from the sun but the energy emitted from the solar surface by sunspots.

This affects the upper atmosphere, which in turn influences conditions closer to the ground.

Prof Lockwood, who is also based at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratories in Oxfordshire, has shown that historically when sunspot activity is low, the jet stream changes direction to bring on the freezing weather.

The sun is currently very quiet, having recently passed through the “solar minimum”, the low point in an 11-year solar cycle that peaks at the “solar maximum”.

This will lead to more cold spells in the next few months and years, he believes.

“November is a pretty good predictor of what December through February is going to be like,” he said.

Yet while stockpiling of road grit may have to continue for the next few years, these conditions did not mean that climate change was over, Prof Lockwood warned.

“The big thing people need to appreciate is the weather they experience on a local or a regional scale is not the same thing as global temperatures,” he said.

“Our colder winters mean almost nothing in terms of global averages. That is why climate change is a better term than global warming.”

And just a note that in this region we experience the opposite, it is 1 of December, but +28C outside, and not even one drop of rain. Apparently it's the hottest and driest winter in 48 years. Don't know if it has any relation to the jet stream that blew over Northern Africa, but maybe.

Hope you are keeping warm!

 

[rylek]

I've been following the Jet stream disruption over the last week or so and it's quite frankly scary.

Here in Scotland it's been snowing for a week now. Five years ago there was early December snowfall classified as 'most in 50 years'. Well what we're getting now is more like 'the most in a couple of hundred years'. The current weather conditions are something we would 'normally' have in January and at most would last for a few days. Not to mention that this weather is at the end of November.

According to weather forecasts, over the next days weather in Europe should get worse...

Check out these forecast model maps, something quite nasty is on it's way.

http://wxmaps.org/pix/euro.vv.html

Please give us back our global warming.

I could and a lot of others would very much welcome some of that global warming now.

 

[sitta]

Please give us back our global warming.

I could and a lot of others would very much welcome some of that global warming now.

It would be great to have warm weather.

In Poland, average temperature for the night of the 30th of Nov. was -20C, record temp -34 on ground level in the Bialystok city. Brr

 

[Z...]

The only problems is that the Jet stream has been severely disrupted : a few days ago it was almost nonexistent above the Atlantic ocean and around European longitude it blew above Northern Africa instead of Northern Europe (such a Southern path had never been witnessed according to meteorologists).

I can vouch for this, we are experiencing extremely hot and humid weather here for last week or so, even for this part of Mediterranean this is highly unusual

 

[Pierre]

Check out these forecast model maps, something quite nasty is on it's way.

Yes that's quite impressive and unusual. I've added a few drawings to your picture (in red):

From what I understand, we have this freezing high pressure air from Siberia going Southwest up until the Gascony Gulf (because there are lower pressure there).

To be precise this air goes through Siberia but comes directly from the Arctic. Over the Arctic region blows the "Arctic vortex", a strong wind going westward.
It's usually not a problem for Europe because between Arctic and Europe blows the Jet stream eastwards (over Northern Europe latitude).

So the westward Arctic vortex, its high pressure, the absence of Jet Stream create this massive and long lasting Arctic air movement towards the Southwest.

Another problem is that for days there's been a high pressure vertical backbone over the Atlantic Ocean. So, when the cold air coming from the Arctic starts reaching the Atlantic backbone, it "rebounds" and goes eastwards over the Western Europe coasts. It's an "occlusion" phenomenon : there are high pressure all around so the flow "rebounds" and goes almost backwards.

This Arctic air has traveled over thousands of kilometers of seas that should still be quite hot, therefore it should have relatively warmed up when reaching Western France, though it will manage to generate snow more than 200 km East of the Atlantic coast. It means that initially this air was very cold (Arctic origin - absence of Jet Stream) and/or the seas around Northern and Western Europe are quite cold (weak Gulf Stream).

 

[Green_Manalishi]

Just something i found on the net, that introduces the North Atlantic Oscillation into the equation. I did not have much time to look at the above satellite photos, but perhaps they are showing the same thing.


_http://notrickszone.com/2010/11/25/negative-nao-bringing-cold-winters-back-to-europe/

Negative NAO Bringing Cold Winters Back To Europe

By P Gosselin on 25. November 2010

Scandinavia is getting hit hard by extreme cold weather and snowfall, and central Europe is about to follow. Temperatures in northern Sweden have plummeted below the -30°C mark. I don’t know if any records have been broken – perhaps our Swedish readers can let us know.

NAO headed into negative mode, signaling hot summers and cold winters ahead. Source: Wikipedia

For years we heard that the warm winters in Europe over the last couple of decades had been caused by man-made climate change. Now “experts” are finding out that natural cycles are behind it. The Swedish English-language The Local has a report today titled: Bitter winter on the way: expert, which starts off with:

The winter 2010/2011 is set to be as cold and snowy as last year, as a slew of weather phenomena push cold air from the poles down over Sweden, experts predict.

The phenomenon is described in meteorological jargon as the North Atlantic oscillation is entering a negative phase (NAO).

The North Atlantic oscillation (NAO), according to Wikipedia, is a climatic phenomenon in the North Atlantic Ocean of fluctuations in the difference of atmospheric pressure at sea level between the Icelandic low and the Azores high. Through east-west oscillation motions of the Icelandic low and the Azores high, it controls the strength and direction of westerly winds and storm tracks across the North Atlantic.

It’s been known since the 1920s (er, long before man-made climate change entered the picture). The above graphic shows its cyclic behavior.

Wikipedia writes the NAO is a largely atmospheric mode. It is one of the most important manifestations of climate fluctuations in the North Atlantic and surrounding humid climates, but it should not be confused with the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO).

Westerly winds blowing across the Atlantic bring moist air into Europe. In years when westerlies are strong (positive NAO), summers are cool, winters are mild and rain is frequent. If westerlies are suppressed (negative NAO, the temperature is more extreme in summer and winter leading to heatwaves, deep freezes and reduced rainfall.

The Swedish The Local writes:

Prior to last winter the phenomenon had not occurred for years, with the standard situation being that NAO was in a positive phase with warm southwesterly winds bringing mild, almost snow-free winters to northern Europe.

But this has changed since last year. This is the longest it has remained negative - since years. No one can predict what it will do next. And so bitter cold winters, which until recently were believed would be rare in future because of man-made global warming, are back now with a vengeance in Europe, at least until the NAO flips back to its positive mode.

European climate has been regulated by the natural cycles, it turns out, and not at all by CO2. Surprise – surprise! The switch of one atmospheric cycle can change the climate in Europe so that the difference is like night and day.

 

[Pierre]

Negative NAO Bringing Cold Winters Back To Europe

Westerly winds blowing across the Atlantic bring moist air into Europe. In years when westerlies are strong (positive NAO), summers are cool, winters are mild and rain is frequent. If westerlies are suppressed (negative NAO, the temperature is more extreme in summer and winter leading to heatwaves, deep freezes and reduced rainfall.

Yes and that's what Europe seems to experience.

I've tried to understand how all this phenomenon works but unfortunately I'm not a meteorologist. Anyhow I've tried to bring together the changes observed in Gulf stream, Jet stream and European weather These are mere hypothesis.

For days, Europe (above 40° North) didn't get this moist and relatively warm westerly winds coming from the Atlantic. One reason might be the Jet stream weakening / Southern location.

The Jet stream is a high altitude wind that blows along boundaries between warm and cold air. In the winter, cold air advances farther south and pushes the warm/cold boundaries, and Jet stream, south with it.

Now, one reason that could explain the Southern position of the Jet stream might be the Gulf stream.

The Gulf stream heats up the surface of the Northern Atlantic ocean. This surface hot water must to some extent heat up the air above it. It the Gulf stream weakens, the Ocean surface temperatures drop, then the air temperatures above the ocean is lower, then the cold air area shrinks and leaves space for the cold air to move farther south.

Since the Jet stream blows along this warm/cold boundaries, it moves south too.

The same reason might explain the weakening of the Jet stream. Its strength is correlated to the temperature difference between the cold air and warm air it blows between. If, because of the Gulf stream weakening the warm air area is almost as cold as the cold air area then Jet stream speed decreases.

 

[HiThere]

Scandinavia is getting hit hard by extreme cold weather and snowfall, and central Europe is about to follow. Temperatures in northern Sweden have plummeted below the -30°C mark. I don’t know if any records have been broken – perhaps our Swedish readers can let us know.

I live in Norway and the conditions are as described. In Trondheim they have measured the lowest temperatures at this time of year since they started measuring 222 years ago.

 

[clerck de bonk]

Scandinavia is getting hit hard by extreme cold weather and snowfall, and central Europe is about to follow. Temperatures in northern Sweden have plummeted below the -30°C mark. I don’t know if any records have been broken – perhaps our Swedish readers can let us know.

I live in Norway and the conditions are as described. In Trondheim they have measured the lowest temperatures at this time of year since they started measuring 222 years ago.

Affirmative, I live in southern Finland and although no records broke here the weather was unusually cold and in Lapland they had -33°C(which was a recordbreaker I think)

 

[zim]

That`s incredible and I was talking about all the rain that we have had in Costa Rica for the last 3 days with no stop, but our cold is not far than 14 degrees in the capital and 18 degrees in our north zone.

Hope all of you have good sweaters these days!!!!

 

[Gawan]

It's a house in Saint Pol de Leon, France. Saint Pol altitude is an astounding 28 meters (prepare your oxygen mask) and is located in Britain, a Northwestern region along the Atlantic coast.

I think you mean Brittany/Bretagne? Cause I got a little bit confused, where this town is.


Also here in Germany it is pretty cold and the onset of winter caused and still causes some trouble on the streets, for the trains and so on.

Please give us back our global warming.

That would be great. ;)

 

[Pierre]

I think you mean Brittany/Bretagne? Cause I got a little bit confused, where this town is.

Oupps

You're right, it's Britanny and not Britain. I edited the post.

 

[Ageeva]

I decided to buy some winter tyres this summer after reading SOTT reports on the weakening Gulf Stream. My family were amused and thought it a waste of money for the mild temperate climate of Ireland that enjoys the warm breath of the Gulf Stream. After two days of frayed nerves from constantly getting stuck in the snow my dad asked me to order some winter tyres for him :)
The country's coming to a halt just with 10-15 cm of snow. Can't imagine what it's going to be like with one meter plus :O

 

[Pierre]

My family were amused and thought it a waste of money for the mild temperate climate of Ireland that enjoys the warm breath of the Gulf Stream. After two days of frayed nerves from constantly getting stuck in the snow my dad asked me to order some winter tyres for him :)
The country's coming to a halt just with 10-15 cm of snow. Can't imagine what it's going to be like with one meter plus :O

Talking about Ireland, the country is on red alert today and tomorrow (snow, ice, very low temperatures). This alert level is very rarely used.

Here is a picture of the alert level for Europe today.