“Madden-Julian Oscillation”
On April 30, 2009, 18
members and guests came to enjoy good food, company, and to learn a new weather
topic. Our event was held at the 501
Sports Café, in Tualatin, just south of
The MJO is defined
as an area of enhanced and suppressed convection, originates in the
Convection (i.e.,
converging air at the surface and diverging air aloft) is a key trait of a
developing MJO as is the SST pattern.
Consider the MJO as a “mini-ENSO” event.
Look at activity in the
The MJO is divided
into eight phases: phases 1-3 in the Indian Ocean, phases 4-5 over
MJO forecasts can by dynamical or statistical. It is very useful to build a composite analysis and maps. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology tracks the activity of each MJO phase, amplitude, and RMM (http://www.bom.gov.au/bmrc). Need to sort by date and phase, then ENSO state. Compare MJO forecast with weather model forecasts. The MJO is very active during the La Nina phase of ENSO. Future work: (1) difficulty to get the timing of a MJO event (2) refine forecasts by using the composite of similar MJO phase and strength with past years, then add the ENSO component.
For more details, check out these links:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/index.primjo.html
Note-taker: Kyle Dittmer, 2005-2009 OR-AMS President (now Past-President)
