The Jet Stream 2012

[coffee lover]

Hi all, Dont know if I have posted this in the right Section but here goes..

A friend of mine has asked a question, I know some of you will be able to answer...

If the jet stream has moved, does that increase the chances of the gulf stream moving also? If so, Winter could be interesting... ??

Thank you

[knocker]

No there is no connection. Not that i know of anyway. A quick note on the GS.

The Gulf Stream is a massive current of warm water which sweeps up from the Gulf of Mexico to Georgia before swinging out across the Atlantic and becoming the more diffuse North Atlantic Drift. It carries, as heat, the energy of about 20 million power stations, and this is part of the reason that the climate of western Europe is so much less severe than either the equally northerly Labrador or Novosibirsk in Siberia. The path of the Gulf Stream varies by many tens of miles from week to week and from month to month. Where it is at any time affects shipping, fisheries, and the weather along the Atlantic seaboard of the USA.

[Dee-Dee]

Hi all,

As a newbie, could anyone tell me the longest time that the jetstream has remained static,could we still have the jetstream further south than usual come winter time?

[knocker]

Hi all,

As a newbie, could anyone tell me the longest time that the jetstream has remained static,could we still have the jetstream further south than usual come winter time?

It can be further south than usual but that's not say it will be this year just because it's further south at the moment. I've no idea the longest it has stayed static (not really a good word to describe the jetstream ), but taking a pop I think during the winter of 62/63 it remained further south than usual for a fair length of time. Somebody will probably correct me on this as I haven't checked and I'm relying on a rapidly disappearing memory.

[UV-RAY]

The only influence it does have which has been shown recently ( but can't find the link when needed ), is how a Southerly tracking Jet can temporarily cool the Gulf stream. Maybe someone can find the relevant paper I'm referring too.

[knocker]

One thing you have to mindful of is that the jet may be south in the eastern Atlantic but north in the west as now. The jet in the western Atlantic at the moment is north of the main part of the GS.

[Dee-Dee]

Thanks Knocker

As a newbie perhaps my terminology is in correct( sorry) but thanks for your reply

[knocker]

Hey I wasn't criticising Dee-Dee.

[Dee-Dee]

Thats ok Knocker no offence taken.

Are their any insights into how we feel the jetstream will behave come Autumn and winter?

[johnholmes]

Not any direct link that I know of. As with many things meteorological one person will show how they are linked and another equally knowledgable one will argue the opposite. All I could suggest is that you Google something like 'links between Gulf Stream and Atlantic jet stream'?

[Dee-Dee]

Thanks John

[knocker]

Due to summer being a non-event this year every man and his dog seems to want to chat about the jet stream. Even taxi drivers seem fascinated by the position of the jet. So I thought I'd join the club with an anecdote from the past.

During the Second World War, on 1 November 1944, Captain Ralph D. Steakley flew one of the first B29 US high-altitude reconnaissance missions over Tokyo. He and his crew were suddenly

subjected to very heavy winds putting their lives in jeopardy. 'I found myself over Tokyo with a ground speed of about 70 mph. This was quite a shock, particularly since we were under attack from anti-aircraft guns and were a sitting duck for them. Obviously the head wind was about 175 mph.' He did not know it but this was one of the first observations of a jet stream. These fast ribbons of wind occur at 10-12 kilometres up in the atmosphere, are 80-600 kilometres wide, and have speeds of up to 400 kilometres per hour in the centre. They blow from west to east, following the polar front.

Ironically, the Japanese already new about the jet stream from research on balloons carried out before the war. At about the same time as Steakley's mission, they began using the jet stream to carry high altitude balloons called fugos with the intention of attacking the North American mainland and using incendiarybombs to start fires in the forests of the Pacific northwest.

Nine thousand fugos were launched, out of which about a thousand reached America killing six people. As it turned out, the forests were too wet from rain and snow to be set alight. By chance, the most successful fugo attack brought down the power line to Hanford-the plutonium plant that was producing the material from which the atomic bombs were being made.

Source:

Arnold H. Taylor, "The Dance of Air and Sea".

.

[Coast]

Interesting article here from 2003 that points to this not being a new phenomena by any means:

http://www.john-daly.../guests/jet.htm

[greybing]

Interesting article here from 2003 that points to this not being a new phenomena by any means:

http://www.john-daly.../guests/jet.htm

Well ,of course it's not a new phonomenom

[Methuselah]

From what I can gather, we're currently in a spell dominated by a slow and meandering Jet Stream...It could be just 'luck' that, just now, it's meandering southwards. My suspicion, however (it always seems to be southwards in summer?) is that it's not random, that something (persistent high-temperature anomalies in the Arctic regions, perhaps?) is driving it??? Ergot, it ain't about to normalize any day soon!

So my guess (And it is a guess!) is that, over the coming few years, we can expect to endure protracted spells of cold, hot, dry, wet (or any combinations thereof) weather in the UK...

[Interitus]

Ergot, it ain't about to normalize any day soon!

That's a rye look at the jet stream.

[Gael_Force]

That's a rye look at the jet stream.

The clever play on words has actually hit on one of the effects of a very southerly jetstream in past history.

http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/wong/BOT135/LECT12.HTM

[AWD]

Going into "default" mode next week for the first time in months, steering depressions to the NW, allowing pressure to remain higher to the SE.

[Gibby]

Going into "default" mode next week for the first time in months, steering depressions to the NW, allowing pressure to remain higher to the SE.

Yes agreed. how long it remains there we'll have to see but the general consensus from all the output I've seen could keep that general pattern for the next couple of weeks or so.