El Nino & Arctic Warming In the 1930s
By Paul Homewood
Just following up on Joe Bastardi’s article yesterday about El Ninos and Arctic warming, it is worth looking at longer term trends.
Below is the chart of the MEI, with red indicating El Ninos and blue La Ninas.:
Extended Multivariate ENSO Index
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/mei.ext/
As we can see, the period 1925 to 1945 was dominated by powerful El Ninos. This of course was also the time of great warming in the Arctic, known as “The Warming in The North”, when temperatures across much of the Arctic were as high as they are now.
During the 1950s, a much colder climate took over in the Arctic, until it became warmer again in the 90s. This was also a period when La Ninas dominated.
Coincidence?
The climate in the Arctic is also very well correlated with the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO):
Both of the warming regimes were marked by the inflow of warmer Atlantic waters, which also would have had the effect described by Joe Bastardi, ie the introduction of moist air into the Arctic.
Whether the AMO supplemented the effect of super El Ninos, or whether in fact the two oceanic phenomena are interconnected remains to be seen.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
“Both of the warming regimes were marked by the inflow of warmer Atlantic waters, which also would have had the effect described by Joe Bastardi, ie the introduction of moist air into the Arctic.”
And a reduction in Arctic sea ice extent? Volume?
Paul. 2007 marks a change from the downward trend in the Arctic sea ice min extent – nearly flat since. What do you know about this? Never heard it discussed much.
NASA Sees Arctic Ocean Circulation Do an About-Face – 2007
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2007-131
Thanks Gary
That ties in nicely with another paper I am going to report on
Thanks. Look forward to it. Stay well !!
I came across this paper a while ago that describes conditions that may relate. These resulted in the contraction of the Beaufort Gyre and the subsequent increase in the rate of the Transpolar Drift resulting in increased ice loss.
Click to access RigorWallace2004.pdf
Mick.
“The winter AO-index explains as much as 64% ofthe variance in summer sea-ice extent in the Eurasian sector,but the winter and summer AO-indices combined explainless than 20% of the variance along the Alaskan coast,where the age of sea-ice explains over 50% of the year-to-year variability. If this interpretation is correct, low summersea-ice extents are likely to persist for at least a few years.However, it is conceivable that, given an extended intervalof low-index AO conditions, ice thickness and summertimesea-ice extent could gradually return to the levels charac-teristic of the 1980’s”
Well, 2007 was a ‘few years,” and there’s been no significant trend, up or down, since 2007.
Can we call this pause from the downward trend, a transition period, soon to lead to a significant increasing trend?
Time will tell, I suspect.
Some history… ” but the actual term Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) was coined by Michael Mann in a 2000 telephone interview with Richard Kerr, as recounted by Mann, p.30 in The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines (2012).
The AMO signal is usually defined from the patterns of SST variability in the North Atlantic once any linear trend has been removed. This detrending is intended to remove the influence of greenhouse gas-induced global warming from the analysis.:”
Circular reasoning perhaps?
Some history… ” but the actual term Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) was coined by Michael Mann in a 2000 telephone interview with Richard Kerr, as recounted by Mann, p.30 in The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines (2012).
The AMO signal is usually defined from the patterns of SST variability in the North Atlantic once any linear trend has been removed. This detrending is intended to remove the influence of greenhouse gas-induced global warming from the analysis.:”
Circular reasoning perhaps?
Coincidence or concurrency is reason to investigate causation but not proof of causation.
https://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations
‘until it became warmer again in the 90s. This was also a period when La Ninas dominated.’
Typo? Surely the 90s were dominated by el ninos?
Sorry Paul, I was referring to the period between the 1950s and 90s
Paul, you mention the influx of warmer waters to the Arctic, I would add that the reis a strong relationship between winds and currents, and it is quite noticeable that when Atlantic depressions move quickly and northward (rather than the recent westward trend) then charts as shown by the DMI quickly pick up the intrusion of warmer air into the Arctic and the corresponding warm temperature anomalies. There are also other factors that are not considered in assessing the extent of Arctic sea ice, one of which results from these depressions.
The high winds create powerful waves that break up the ice front. Often you will note that whereas the se ice extent has decreased, the volume of sea ice remains the same. This is also due the effect of these depressions.
It is a disgrace that establishment climate scientists never talk about such obvious natural causes of global warming and global cooling. Where do the Met Office experts like Richard Betts stand on these issues? Why do none of them ever contributed on this website, even if only to try and rebut Paul’s facts? I think we know the answer!
“Whether the AMO supplemented the effect of super El Ninos, or whether in fact the two oceanic phenomena are interconnected remains to be seen.” end quote.
In that statement, highlights just how much we do not know about the climatic and oceanic dynamics of our own planet. i firmly believe that if we could solve the conundrum of the above quote, then comprehending how the world’s atmospheric sytem works in combination with the oceanic conveyor would be better explained – however even if we could, we’d still not have anywhere near the full picture.
Thus, predicting climate and future trends – not yet, not in a few hundred light years are we yet, even that close.
El Nino episodes drive major warm pulses to the AMO with about an 8 month lag. E.g. Aug 1998, Aug 2010, Aug 2016 etc.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/correlation/amon.us.data
Bottom line and this is not my original idea by a long shot, but William Gray was right So is John Cahir, This is climate cycle 101 taught in the 1970s All fingers point at water vapor with co2 at best a hangnail in the process. ( or as I said in the Bill Nye movie, band curls o in a circuit vs squats, power clean and pullups, big-ticket movements. Its interesting nature works isn’t it, Be it the body or nature, the big movements make the big results The suns cumulative actions over very long periods, plus and not to be underestimated, underwater volcanic activity is huge, In fact check this out, http://www.plateclimatology.com/further-proof-el-nios-are-fueled-by-deepsea-geological-heat-flow The original research of this started at the University of Illinois back in the 1980s Again think about it, Slight increases in WV where and when it is very cold mean clouds, lower pressures, more instability, What is the result on temps? more clouds, higher temps in the cold season, Just look at the arctic temp anomalies and you can see it as plain as the nose on my face, the warming is all in the winter when WV would have the greatest effect at the lower temps. But what is the result on precip? we are seeing increase snows in the NHEM, People think I am obstinate on the co2 issues, Listen I see what they are looking at, I look more at their ideas than ours. They look at nothing, or pay lip service only to the vast natural drivers that drive this system, it is almost like some kind of messianic complex, elevating man over Gods majestic creation of nature and then dictating from on high what people should do
Peace to all and stay well