Looking Towards Summer

This evening whilst viewing my favorite TV show (Weather World-PCN), Dr Jon Nese was reviewing the February-March temps at 3 locations in PA; one in the NW part of the state, State College, and one in the SE part of the state.  In all 3 of these locations, it appears that March will average cooler for the entire month than February.  As is often the case, the climatologist that lies within Dr Nese went through the data banks and found only THREE common years where March was cooler than February at all 3 locations.  Dr Nese went on to say that there was no real signal as to what to expect for the upcoming summer months in terms of the weather.  Well, I had to check for myself since he did all of the truly heavy lifting by analyzing the March cooler than February months at the 3 locations in PA.  So here is what I found out...

First the temperature anomaly...not much of a signal as Dr Nese stated.  Slightly cooler than normal here...but slightly warmer across the mid-section of the country.  Also, possibly an active hurricane/tropical storm season affecting Florida and a strong on-shore flow across the PAC NW.

As for precip...well...what a mess that is!  Looks like a Christmas Tree!  A total piecemeal of wet/dry areas, some directly juxtaposed with each other.  Florida is wet but the PAC NW surprisingly dry. Looks like a slightly stronger than normal western USA "monsoon", but that is really grasping at straws!  Again, no real strong signal...

As for drought, it looks a tad dry across the northern plains and the Ohio Valley and some signal into the Arklotex region, but adequate moisture for most of the remainder of the country with the lone but typical exception of far western coastal CA.  The Yellowstone River looks like it would be quite low during these years...

So what's up for June-August 2017?  Not really too sure yet...just so most of the country is under clear skies for August 21!  The Great American Eclipse will traverse this great country.  May high pressure grace our continent and inhibit convection this day!

With all of that said, I will continue to try to look for signals as to what this summer might bring.  But it will certainly bring an astronomical phenomenon of one's lifetime!  So get out and enjoy it...and enjoy this...

Only a few days until MLB opening day...summer has to be just around the corner!

Smitty

AA:  Summer, using only one set of data, looks to be reasonably normal in these parts with the exception of a 75-80% eclipse of the sun here in our region...gotta go just a tad south and/or west to be in the path of totality!