Seasonal predictability of the winter North Atlantic Oscillation from a jet stream perspective

Parker, T., Woollings, T., Weisheimer, A., O'Reilly, C., Baker, L. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0738-9488 and Shaffrey, L. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2696-752X (2019) Seasonal predictability of the winter North Atlantic Oscillation from a jet stream perspective. Geophysical Research Letters, 46 (16). pp. 10159-10167. ISSN 1944-8007 doi: 10.1029/2019GL084402

Abstract/Summary

The winter North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) has varied on interannual and decadal timescales over the last century, associated with variations in the speed and latitude of the eddy-driven jet stream. This paper uses hindcasts from two operational seasonal forecast systems (the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts's seasonal forecast system, and the U.K. Met Office global seasonal forecast system) and a century-long atmosphere-only experiment (using the European Centre for Medium-range Weather Forecasts's Integrated Forecasting System model) to relate seasonal prediction skill in the NAO to these aspects of jet variability. This shows that the NAO skill realized so far arises from interannual variations in the jet, largely associated with its latitude rather than speed. There likely remains further potential for predictability on longer, decadal timescales. In the small sample of models analyzed here, improved representation of the structure of jet variability does not translate to enhanced seasonal forecast skill.

Item Type	Article
URI	https://reading-clone.eprints-hosting.org/id/eprint/88178
Item Type	Article
Refereed	Yes
Divisions	Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > NCAS Science > School of Mathematical, Physical and Computational Sciences > Department of Meteorology
Publisher	Wiley
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