Jim Hughes wrote:It only has to be > .5 for three consectutives months Benny not five. As for 2004-05. It met the criteria of their definition. So you tell me why they tend to downplay it's existence .
7/04 + .61
8/04 + .83
9/04 + .83
10/04 + .79
11/04 +.79
12/04 +.84
01/05 + .59
It was weaker than 2002 but one has to wonder if the reason centers around their lack of forecasting it. Or how it hardly did anything to the 04 tropical season. The tropics quieted down after the September 90 day SOI average became extremely high not while the SST's got above .5 The latter first happened in July 04 as the above numbers show.
So the guideline that everyone around here likes to go by was useless back then and it's been useless this season as well. The extremeness in the 90 SOI average ( > 10.0-11.0) is a much better indicator of how the atmosphere is behaving when it comes to forecasting tropical activity.
This is what I have been trying to get across within this forum. What you think is correct is not always true.
As for the probable storm total lowering ahead. I would tend to agree. We are currently running at 33% of last years pace. That would put us right around average if this were to continue. (10/5/2)
On another note. The winter of 04-05 had plenty of EL Nino characteristics. Just ask the people in Southern/Central California. Storm after storm.
No, actually here is their definition found at:
http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/analys ... ears.shtml
"Warm (red) and cold (blue) episodes based on a threshold of +/- 0.5oC for the Oceanic Niño Index (ONI) [3 month running mean of ERSST.v2 SST anomalies in the Niño 3.4 region (5oN-5oS, 120o-170oW)], based on the 1971-2000 base period. For historical purposes cold and warm episodes (blue and red colored numbers) are defined when the threshold is met for a minimum of 5 consecutive over-lapping seasons."
Just because it is above 0.5 for 3 months doesn't qualify it as a Nino for historical purposes.
The SOI might be more appropriate but over the long haul, the Nino 3.4 SSTs have worked the same as the SOI. The SOI is just two places on the globe and really doens't capture all the variability across the globe.
Look NOAA lowered its forecast in Aug 04 b/c of all the warm water if I remembered correctly and got burned. Past performance isn't necesarily indicative of the future of course... so maybe this year the SOI will be a better indicator. I don't have a whole lot else to add other than we have a long ways to go in understanding when weak/moderate el Ninos like 1969 and 2004 do zero to the Atlantic season when seemingly similar episodes like 2006 or 1968 "may" crush the season.