Current Monthly/Seasonal Forecast (July 2007) Note: The monthly and seasonal outlooks (below) are based primarily on climate phenomena that exhibit a relatively large degree of predictability such as the El Niņo / Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle, as well as decade-to-decade variability and trends. Extratropical circulation patterns on monthly to seasonal time scales [such as the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)] also significantly impact the monthly and seasonal temperature and precipitation patterns, sometimes distorting expected ENSO-related patterns. However, since the long-range predictability of these extratropical circulation patterns is very limited, they are not explicitly represented in the extended-range forecasts. To take these uncertainties into account, probabilities of temperature and precipitation are decreased (increased) in regions where the variability associated with these patterns is large (small).
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