>Was July’s Cold Significant?

> image source http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2009/images/07statewidetrank.png

worth a read http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2009/20090810_julystats.html

Well, you look at that map from NOAA and you tell me whether it was significant or not..
I have been dying to see this map and what actually resulted during July 2009 is nothing short of remarkable. To achieve this type of cold is out of the ordinary. A picture speaks of a thousand words and this tell me a thousand things, well maybe not a thousand but I shall give you my ideas and reasons for why this speaks of great significance to me..
1) July is the warmest month for the USA overall. It is very difficult to (a) have cold in the first place when high pressure is too strong and the equatorial heat sources move north and sit too close to North America normally to have “cold” or cool air, it’s often forced not only up into Canada but ARCTIC CANADA which by the way over recent years has been abnormally warm. But (b) even more significant is to SUSTAIN this cold over the United States where normally the Four Corners and Bermuda high join forces to pump hot air across the country with periods of heat wave conditions from Pacific to Atlantic coast. It is tough to see cold air anywhere in the lower 48 but even tougher to keep it there, remember how far south in latitude the USA actually is. It’s as far south as North Africa and southern Canada all the way up to Hudson Bay is as far south as the British Isles!
In days in which support second warmest June’s globally and an age in which earth’s temperature is still above normal, never mind the fact it’s cooling off, it’s strange to see such a cold July across the USA in such a warm age. This makes me ask the question, Is it such a warm age these days? I understand cooling of the earth is happening but I seriously would have thought a July this cold would have been only for those frigid years on our earth back in the late 1800s to early 1900s, the years of the Dalton Minimum. Though, in saying that, it’s funny how we’re seeing such low solar activity, what lowest since 1928? Hum, interesting.
Just look closely at the numbers and how significant they really are. Firstly I point out where it was warmer than normal. All those numbers are insignificant, nowhere near those states warmest Julys on record so many many Julys have been much warmer than 2009, so where it has been warm, it‘s not significantly for the entire month, despite significant warmth occurring periods on a few days out of the month. But where it’s been cold, it’s very rare and very significant. From Iowa to Pennsylvania, there has never been a colder July in recorded history, therefore out doing cold summers that occurred during previous cold periods like the 70s and back to the late 1800s/early 1900s. Does that mean an even fiercer winter than expected in brewing? I don’t know. From the Front Range of the Rockies to Eastern Seaboard, one of the coldest on record. North Dakota to New York state saw at the least a top-5 cold July with Minnesota and Michigan experiencing their third and second coldest July on record. Tennessee a far south location and almost always hot in summer simply because it sits under a semi-permanent high saw their third coldest July. It’s stunning to see southern states experience one of their coldest Julys…Where it has been hot, it wasn’t significantly so in terms of for the state. Places like McAllen and what not have see a significantly hot July, but there have been 102 hotter July’s for the state of Texas overall. Even more interesting is that Washington state has seen 104 HOTTER July’s despite Seattle hitting a new alltime record of 103. I strongly believe this record would not have been set if it were not for the deep cold pool to the east of Washington. As mentioned before, the dislodging of cold air from northern Canada and shoving it into a southern region, pushes the heat core from the deserts and forced north to balance things out, therefore the heat core was situated over Seattle than Las Vegas or Phoenix. Same goes for the cold core displaced and stationed over Chicago than Churchill, Manitoba!
Though I am surprised at the magnitude of just how cold July 2009 was, I am not surprised at it being below normal, albeit slightly. Though there’s nothing “slightly below normal for the Ohio Valley” with it recording it’s coldest on record. This is a mere a new chapter of the great cooling off of North America. As I have spoke of persistently about the “corridor of cold” shifting eastward, last summer saw cooling than normal further west in the Plains, same for the winter with 07-08 seeing colder over the west and central continent, last winter seeing it over the plains and Midwest and into Ohio Valley, the summer pattern has reflected this and I urge you to look at that map above and watch this repeat itself in January 2010 only move it slightly further east from the Ohio Valley to East Coast. The Pacific is a good part responsible for this July’s cold and the past two straight winters. The pattern was set in 2007 when strong cooling took place in the Pacific and then came the La Nina of 2008, this set off the fierce cold from Alaska to central plains, the cold lingered through summer 08 before shifting slightly east for winter 08-09’s bitter cold, summer 09 illustrates the continued and sustained cold and all sets the stage nicely for the 09-10 winter from Ohio Valley to East Coast. Though July globally was warm, the earth is still experiencing global warming. The Atlantic is still in it’s warm mode and thus supporting abnormal warmth is many areas, but signally is showing that the warm AMO has matured and is reversing towards cool as the tropical Atlantic cools off from Africa to Caribbean Sea. The Pacific though warmed this summer thanks to El Nino will quickly fade as the El Nino is a reaction the recent cooling, may sound like a contradiction but La Nina’s can’t sustain themselves forever and therefore eventually warming needed to take place, but this warming is cut short by a cold Pacific. Thus shadowing a feedback across North America AND South America making it’s presence felt on these two continents. By bringing a gradual cooling through winters, summers will start to cool also, each time a summer cools, the more magnified a following winter could be. I believe the cold summer so far across the eastern US illustrates a cold winter ahead for 09-10, where’s cold shows up now, cold shows up later, but to winter depths… The continents warm and cool in relationship with cooling of their surrounding oceans. The Pacific is the great heat reservoir on our planet, by cooling this, it then casts a cooling shadow and with North America to it’s east, it starts cooling off the western part of the continent first, as the general atmospheric motion moves west to east across the hemisphere, so too will the shadow of cold. With the temporary warming of the equatorial Pacific and coupled with seasonal high’s that max out in the western US, naturally warmer than normal will form over the west, but because of the large bubble of cold from the plains on east, the heat this year has been forced north up into the Pacific Northwest and all the way to Arctic regions of Canada and Alaska. All this setting the winter pattern now, not later. Global warming reached maximum heights in 1998, therefore the higher you climb, the further you must fall before reaching the level ground again. Our earth is starting it’s decent to normal but it takes time to fall, therefore global warming is still happening and will do for quite some time, however the commencement of large scale, global cooling has begun with the Pacific, so watch as North America cools, a stark evidence is illustrated well by last January and last winters cold, this summers cold and will be carried into this upcoming winter. Meanwhile, the rippling of Pacific cold is changing the Atlantic as well as the cooling down of the Southern Ocean. These vast heat storage tanks cool slowly, but once cooled down, they cast shadows across their smaller neighbours (continents). I expect the Atlantic to continue cooling from equator to pole, all the warmest waters now are either over the Arctic and surrounding the British Isles or along the coasts of continents, evidence of a waning cycle. Like a stone dropping into water, the ripples push out from the focal point which is where the stone makes impact with the water.
As for Europe, that’s a trickier one. North America has a head start in the cooling process as they sit beside an ocean in it’s cold cycle, Europe sits beside an ocean still in it’s warm mode, however, last winters bitter cold and complete reversal to at least 10 years worth of warm winters, last winter may well be the first physical signs of reversal in the Atlantic but still abnormally warm waters lingering keeps me from saying cold, cold cold for Western Europe but not necessarily for central, interior Europe which will cool faster. However expanding and deepening of the Arctic cold may make winters colder sooner rather than later and may cool off the North Atlantic faster than I would expect. Expanding of Arctic cold, may make those types of air masses move closer to the British Isles and western Europe but time will tell. As for broader, global scale picture, the cooling down takes time. What was once small cool pockets, are becoming bigger and covering bigger areas. Soon warm pockets that expanded across vast areas with warmer oceans across the world, will soon shrink as Pacific and Atlantic as well as other oceans growing cold. That is why areas that see extreme heat and it seems only the US has seen significant cold, seems insignificant when looking at the big picture, well, we perhaps need to look closer to the bigger picture to understand to natural processes at work to understand what “appears” smaller significances. From small things come big things and often the big things don’t start off big….
Recent years solar cycles and sunspots are becoming more and more included in reasoning behind long-term climate. Greater understanding of the sun and it’s linkage to our earth’s climate could answer many unanswered questions. It’s evident we have seen cooler periods when the sun has been at a minimum and warmer times during solar maximums. The low solar sunspot cycle and cooling of earth is running parallel with each other and makes for very interesting days, astronomical meteorologists and NASA appear to becoming more in agreement that a solar minumum is not only occurring but a deep and long term lull in the sun is happening and potential is there for a Dalton Minimum repeat is possible. Remember, that last Dalton Minimum occurred during the last deep cooling episode back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, up to 1940.
Thanks for reading.
-Mark