NOAA’s Earth System Research Lab image continues to show a heat wave over northern Canada, Hudson Bay, and Greenland. Meanwhile, much of the US is average, or even above in much of the midwest.
Big Snow does not equal colder – quite the opposite. Did I say things were complex?
And you don’t have to tell me, because I was there, it was snowing 3 inches an hour in the Berkshire Mountains. I barely got out. Hartford Connecticut, and I’m sure, several other areas, set new snowfall records. Yet, as Capital Climate points out:
January 13, 2 am Update: Note that through the first 11 days of the month, there had been only 2 days with below-average temperatures at Hartford. The 12th, on which the snowfall record was set, was 1° below average. The month so far is 2.2° above average.
In other words, get used to it. This is what snowfall events will be like more and more often, in the areas that get snow. More warmth in the atmosphere = more moisture = greater precipitation events, like the current disaster down under.
It interesting to note with the northeaster that brought about 20 inches of snow to my house that the
Gulf Stream had such a marked sst anomaly that had been quite evident for sometime.