NOAA Updates it’s Four-Season Outlook On February 16, 2023 – Potential El Niño impacts were considered in the outlooks for autumn 2023 and next winter
Updated at 3:05 p.m. EST February 17, 2023 to incorporate information on the latest Sudden Stratospheric Warming (SSW) event
On the third Thursday of the month right on schedule NOAA issued what I describe as their Four-Season Outlook. The information released also included the MId-Month Outlook for the single month of March plus the weather and drought outlook for the next three months. I present the information issued and try to add context to it. It is quite a challenge for NOAA to address the subsequent month, the subsequent three-month period as well as successive three-month periods for a year or a bit more.
It is very useful to read the excellent discussion that NOAA issues with this Seasonal Outlook. The CPC/IRI analysis suggests that ENSO will very soon return to Neutral with a La Nino bias and gradually transition to true Neutral, Neutral with an El Nino bias, and then solidly El Nino. Confidence in the first part of that sequence of transitions is higher than in the latter part of the sequence.