Average Temperature in New York Running 5 Degrees Above Normal

Average Temperature in New York Running 5 Degrees Above Normal

Not including Thanksgiving Day the average temperature in New York is running more than 5 degrees above normal. These are the Central Park numbers through Wednesday.

If the month ended today it would finish tied for the warmest November on record which takes out November 2001. Those of you who remember back to the winter of 2001-2002 will probably know that the winter that followed produced a whopping 5 inches of snow for the entire winter season! Not that necessarily means a sub par winter but when we looked back at the 15 warmest Novembers, 11 of those 15 finished below normal. Given the weather expect Friday with highs in the 60s, and temperatures at best near or a little below normal over the weekend and into next week, it seems a pretty good bet that the month will finish number 1 or certainly no worse than number 2 on the all time warmest Novembers since 1869.

December begins next week and when we look a the upper air pattern across the Arctic we notice that nothing much has changed with regards to the upper air pattern as this video illustrates. I’m doing something a little different here in that we are going to look at actual air temperatures across North America which clearly shows what the issue is.

While a split flow has developed which is beginning to allow weather systems to come in from the Pacific in the subtropical jet stream, what has not changed is the atmospheric profile in Northern Canada and the Arctic and at least according to this model, it is not going to change anytime in the next 2 weeks. Until the vortex repositions itself and creates an opening for Arctic air to come into Canada and the United States, warmer than normal temperatures are going to continue. There is no help coming from the Atlantic side as the North America Oscillation or NAO will remain above the neutral line for at least the next 2 weeks though it will begin to trend toward zero. A negative reading can favor colder weather in the east. Right now however it appears El Nino is trumping everything and dominating the weather scene. Something has to give somewhere. In other words, snow and cold lovers need to pray for this!