NOAA Updates its Seasonal Outlook on February 15, 2024 – MJO, Neg AO, Possible SSW Make the March Outlook Quite Interesting
On the third Thursday of the month right on schedule NOAA issued their updated Seasonal Outlook which I describe as their Four-Season Outlook because it extends a bit more than one year into the future. The information released also included the Mid-Month Outlook for the following month plus the weather and drought outlook for the next three months. I present the information issued by NOAA 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 the twelve successive three-month periods for a year or a bit more.
With respect to the long-term part of the Outlook which I call the Four-Season Outlook, there is a fairly rapid transition from El Nino to ENSO Neutral to LaNina. So getting the timing right is very challenging.
First, Let’s Take a Look at the (mid-month) Outlook for March.
It will be updated on the last day of February
The top row is what is now called the Mid-Month Outlook for next month which will be updated at the end of this month. There is a temperature map and a precipitation map. The second row is a three-month outlook that includes next month. I think the outlook maps are self-explanatory. What is important to remember is that they show deviations from the current definition of normal which is the period 1991 through 2020. So this is not a forecast of the absolute value of temperature or precipitation but the change from what is defined as normal or to use the technical term “climatology”.
| Notice that the Outlook for next month and the three-month Outlook are somewhat different. This tells us that April and May will be different than March to some extent. |
