Cold Winter in U.S.? The Big Picture for North America '09-'10

[StClone]

Warm air seemed to have slopped up over the Arctic/Northern Canada and sent the cold unusually far south along with associated wintry weather.


This from the Global Climate Change deniers over at Accuweather.








http://www.accuweather.com/blogs/news/story/25948/surprising-canadian-warmth-thi.asp

[alfredo]

1. Was El Nino a result or cause of the blocking highs? Did one benefit

the other? Or was it a case of "shit happens."

[StClone]

3. Records show that 2009 was second warmest year

In the past 130 years. Blocking highs or not the fact it was cold in the U.S. this winter has no real meaning when it is set among the big picture.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/01/2009-temperatures-by-jim-hansen/

[alfredo]

10. Don't you understand? When it is raining outside your window

it is raining all over the world.

[Tindalos]

6. A bit of all of the above

Phillips says the extraordinary winter appears to be tied to several factors, chief among them El Nino, a shift in the winds and ocean currents in the Pacific Ocean, and the shrinking Arctic ice, which has thinned and retreated markedly in recent years.

"I think it's a combination of a strong El Nino and the shrinking and disappearance of the ice at the top of the world," says Phillips, adding that changing "pressure spots" in the Arctic and Atlantic also played a role. "They've all been working in cahoots to create this unbelievable winter."

http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Weird+winter+signal+years+come+Climatologist/2663607/story.html


And apparently this might become the new normal.


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[alfredo]

9. As long as we don't have a "new normal" every year it won't

be so bad. We would adapt. If it is the beginning of a climate crash, one of the victims of the ongoing mass extinction could be us.

[existentialist]

2. That is believable.

But don't expect any apologies from Sen. Inhofe any time soon.

[StClone]

4. In the hereafter

Satan will laugh and ask, "Hot enough for you?"

[izquierdista]

5. If you examine the map,

you will see a singularity over the Inhofe house, where the next Ice Age has started. :rofl:

[alfredo]

11. That's Inhofe standing on his head. From that perspective,

you can see where he got his ideas.

[Tindalos]

7. That's really messed up

Even the weather is going topsy-turvey.

-----------------------

[Double T]

8. Well there YOU have it; there is no such thing as global warming.

[Electric Monk]

12. I blame VanOC

Kidding, of course...

Hey, did ya hear it snowed in New York?

[The Straight Story]

13. Some areas warmer, some colder. Seems like a typical winter

:)

[existentialist]

14. It just happened that

many of us happen to live in areas where is was a substantially colder winter than average.

For me personally it was my second coldest winter, topped only by the winter of '96-'97.

[Bill McBlueState]

15. even the Northeast was a little warmer than usual

What the global warming deniers didn't understand is that, in a place that's usually as cold as the Northeast, it can be a few degrees warmer than usual and still be cold enough for heavy snow.