Global Precipitation & Temperature Outlook for February 2017

3 February 2017

Overview
The February 2017 Outlook indicates much warmer than normal temperatures for France, Germany, the UK, and Scandinavia. The Central Amazon Basin should see much wetter than normal conditions.

Precipitation Outlook
The forecast shows relatively few exceptional precipitation anomalies, and a generous portion of the world can expect normal (shown in white) to mild anomalies (pale green or pale yellow). However, a few areas stand out with more intense conditions expected.

Moderate to severe dry anomalies are forecast for Turkey and Yunnan, southern Sichuan, and Guangdong, China with some extreme anomalies in far eastern Tibet.

Primarily moderate dry anomalies are expected from New Mexico and western Texas, US southward through much of northern Mexico, and trailing down Peru's coast. Moderate dry anomalies are also forecast in: the Caucasus and into far western Kazakhstan; Georgia; parts of Albania, Bulgaria, and Romania; eastern India; Northeast China; Taiwan; southern Honshu and eastern Hokkaido; and central Borneo.

Precipitation outlook. Reds indicate below normal monthly total precipitation. Blues indicate above normal monthly total precipitation. The darker the color, the more extreme the anomaly relative to a 1950-2009 climatic baseline. Colors are based on… — Precipitation outlook. Reds indicate below normal monthly total precipitation. Blues indicate above normal monthly total precipitation. The darker the color, the more extreme the anomaly relative to a 1950-2009 climatic baseline. Colors are based on the expected return period of the anomalies.

Exceptionally wetter than normal conditions are forecast in the Central Amazon Basin of Brazil.

Moderate with isolated pockets of extreme wet anomalies are forecast for: the US Northwest; southern Guatemala; El Salvador; central Peru; far northern Bolivia; central Argentina; the UK; southern Norway; a narrow strip of the West African coast from Liberia to Nigeria; eastern Kenya; northern Somalia; parts of southern Africa; central Iran; Guizhou, China; and southwestern Australia.

Temperature Outlook
What is immediately apparent in the Temperature Outlook is the vast block of red in Europe up through Scandinavia.

Severe to exceptionally warmer temperatures are forecast in Sardinia, Corsica, and Piedmont, Italy; Switzerland, France, UK, Germany, Luxembourg, Belgium, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland and into Russia. Eastern Europe is expected to be warmer than normal as well, but to a lesser degree than the aforementioned areas.

Temperature outlook. Reds indicate above normal monthly average temperature. Blues indicate below normal monthly average temperature. The darker the color, the more extreme the anomaly relative to a 1950-2009 climatic baseline. Colors are based… — Temperature outlook. Reds indicate above normal monthly average temperature. Blues indicate below normal monthly average temperature. The darker the color, the more extreme the anomaly relative to a 1950-2009 climatic baseline. Colors are based on the expected return period of the anomalies.

Warm anomalies ranging from moderate to exceptional are forecast for: much of China; Myanmar; Thailand; Laos; India's southern half; Borneo; Papua; and central and eastern Australia.

Also notable is a vast area of warmer than normal anomalies radiating from Texas and covering much of the central US; and through northern Mexico where anomalies may be exceptional.

Exceptional warm anomalies are also forecast for Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil.

An expanse of moderate warm anomalies is expected across much of Russia from north of Mongolia to the east.

Moderate to extreme warm anomalies are forecast in eastern Madagascar.

About This Blog Post
Each week, ISciences processes an ensemble of 28 seasonal temperature and precipitation forecasts issued by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Forecast System Version 2 (CFSv2). We present our results in a proprietary weekly report titled Global Water Monitor and Forecast: Precipitation and Temperature Outlook. This blog post summarizes our Outlook released February 3, 2017 which includes forecasts for February 2017 through October 2017 based on NOAA CFSv2 forecasts issued January 25 through January 31, 2017.

Technical details:

Each CFSv2 forecast is bias corrected by:
- Constructing probability density functions from CFSv2 hindcasts.
- Fitting the hindcast probability distribution functions to a generalized extreme value distribution.
- Using an inverse lookup to an extreme value distribution fitted to the observed temperature and precipitation record (Fan & van den Dool 2008, Chen et al. 2002).
The map colors depict the return period of the median forecast anomaly.
Regions where the interquartile range of the ensemble spans both above normal and below normal conditions are hashed as having uncertain direction.
Regions where the interquartile range of the ensemble divided by the median forecast is large (>0.4) are hashed as having uncertain magnitude.
Results are reported in terms of return period using a 1950-2009 baseline.