An expanding Northern Eurasia snow cover cools the atmosphere aloft and forces a broad low-pressure trough during mid-November. To compensate, a ridiculously resilient ridge (RRR) stays intact across eastern North America and Western Europe enhanced by lack of snow cover and a marine heat wave (MHW) west of Europe.

The Australia Bureau of Meteorology adds the following statement to their ENSO outlooks: “Global SSTs remain at near record levels, with temperatures since July being just short of the record temperatures observed during 2023, yet above all other years since observations began in 1854. The sustained nature of this significant global ocean heat suggests that climate indicators such as ENSO and IOD may not behave or evolve as they have in the past.”