Compare the Europe&Asia snow cover

I found useful site for checking for snow cover information this year and previous years. You can compare how much snow covers have changed in previous years on this date (8th of January). You can clearly see this year has smallest snowcover.







www.natice.noaa.gov...

And winter 2007 was unusually warm too, the snow cover was much smaller in some parts than this year:

Would the reason for less snow cover be related to less precipitation or higher temperatures?

reply to post by butcherguy


Neither and both. The question is a false dichotomy.

The climate is a chaotic system with countless variables. Rarely would one or two parameters force the system that is at a relatively steady state. Unfortunately for life on Earth, the chaotic system, can, through a combination of some number of parameters can reach a tipping point and swing abruptly from one steady state to another. Saying it's difficult to model would be a gross understatement. There may be external events like cosmic rays or volcanoes that end up forcing the system one way or another.

If we look at all the data, we must come to the realization that "bottom up" climate models steered with recent climate observations have little or no predictive power. For example, when you run the model backward, you don't get results anywhere near what the climate record looks like.

Science can't yet explain the major oscillations between ice age and warm period. Understanding the nature and parameters of this macro oscillation is job one, -not tinkering with known feedback loops of the existing models to get a degree here and there. Science is an ideal applied imperfectly by humans. I hope the answers are found before something really bad happens.

reply to post by InverseLookingGlass

If we look at all the data, we must come to the realization that "bottom up" climate models steered with recent climate observations have little or no predictive power. For example, when you run the model backward, you don't get results anywhere near what the climate record looks like.

Yep.

But for this given year.... If snow cover is down from last year, either:

There was less precipitation, directly relating to less snow cover... regardless of the temperatures,
Or
Temperatures are higher, meaning that less of the precipitation would fall as snow.

So, you guys on the other side of the world aren't getting hammered with a bad winter. It's still January. Plus, I seem to remember that you all had a deep freeze going on in years past with rivers freezing that hadn't frozen previously and people dying of the cold.

It's to be expected that there will be mild winters. And maybe part of the reason you are getting mild winters has to do with the facts that N. America is being selfish with all the cold air right now. Enjoy it while you can.

I can't see where the amount has changed that much, but the areas of coverage have it seems.

butcherguy
reply to post by InverseLookingGlass

 

If we look at all the data, we must come to the realization that "bottom up" climate models steered with recent climate observations have little or no predictive power. For example, when you run the model backward, you don't get results anywhere near what the climate record looks like.

Yep.

But for this given year.... If snow cover is down from last year, either:

There was less precipitation, directly relating to less snow cover... regardless of the temperatures,
Or
Temperatures are higher, meaning that less of the precipitation would fall as snow.

Less precipitation could mean less water in the atmosphere which could mean lower evaporation rates which could be caused by lower average global temperatures which could mean global cooling, not global warming. If you simply look at one day without taking into account global data, you can probably get any answer you want.

Cheers - Dave

Those climate models still don't include clouds, the climate modelers just cannot work out how to type in cloud models when trying to type a comprehensive model of 'weather' and as rain, hail, and snow is delivered by clouds, seems to me the 'climate models' are next to useless.

Situation isn't as bad as in 2007, but this year is one of warmest winters. Its not about precipitation, the weather is rainy. The problem is temperature, that stays above the zero. Water levels are high everywhere, even the ground water levels. We got early winter, but it was just few weeks. After that the temperatures have stayed above zero. Even Christmas was rainy, far from white. Its not rare to have week long warmer periods, but this has lasted almost 2 months. Some weird weather anomaly keeps pushing low pressure centers from Atlantic towards Scandinavia. They bring rain and warmer weather. Currently the wind is turning from north, which will bring snow and colder weather, but European long-term predictions predict warmer winter, so they situation could continue.

The birds are starting to sing like during the spring, nature is preparing for the spring already.

And have to say, European forecasters predicted mild winter during the autumn, I guess they were right

reply to post by bobs_uruncle

Just to be clear, I do not believe in AGW.

I was just stating that there would be just two reasons for less snow cover this season. And snow cover is widely variable from year to year anyway. It takes very little precipitation to show up as snow cover.

reply to post by Thebel

Come over to North America.
If cold is what you want, we can fix you up.
I prefer the warmth.

butcherguy
reply to post by Thebel

 

Come over to North America.
If cold is what you want, we can fix you up.
I prefer the warmth.

Yes please, I'm sick of this English winter type weather

Btw, now its going to minus degrees, but I haven't seen sun for a while. I don't even remember when I saw it last time. I live pretty north, but Sun should stay above the horizon for couple hours, but can't see it through this heavy cloud cover.