Repost this 2019 blog post by Dr. Roy Spencer.
May 29, 2019 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
I had a op-ed published at Foxnews.com yesterday describes why we have so many tornadoes this year. The answer is that cold weather continues to stretch from Michigan through Colorado to California. A persistent cold air mass north and west of the usual position of warm, moist Gulf air to the east is essential for alternate thunderstorms to be embedded in a strong wind shear environment.
Different-than-normal temperatures so far this month show evidence of this cold snap:
In fact, in terms of departure times compared to normal, the Northern Plains have been “the coldest place on Earth” by far this year, averaging 5-10 degrees. F below normal:
Strong wind shear and warm convection are provided at the “tight” boundary between warm and cold air masses that are often missing components in tornado formation, unlike Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s claim that the landscape Tornado reports in New Jersey are somehow related to global warming.
As has been pointed out other places, a trendline consistent with the number of strong-to-severe U.S. tornadoes dropped from 60 in 1954 to 30 in 2018. In other words, the number of tornadoes that caused average damage average has halved since the US census began. compiled:
Or to put it another way, the last half of the 65-year record for U.S. tornadoes has 40 percent fewer strong-to-severe tornadoes than the first half.
Claims that global warming is causing more tornadoes than speculated; it is in direct opposition to clear observational evidence.
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