Next week a major rainfall event is indicated across the Gulf of Mexico and Florida. A frontal system stalls over the northwest/north Gulf while to the south a tropical system emerges. The combination of the two events leads too heavy to extreme rain.

Comparing September 2023, the 9th month of an El Nino year, to the past 3 vigorous or moderate El Nino episodes indicates El Nino 2023 is moderately strong and trending toward the weaker El Nino’s regarding subsurface fuel supply and sustain the warm ENSO event.

The 12Z GFS 15-day forecast is much wetter across most of the eastern half of the U.S. If so, much needed rainfall occurs in the Mississippi River Valley where river levels have been very low in recent weeks.

“If only it were December” was probably a common expression amongst meteorologists, energy traders, and analysts yesterday as the 1200 GMT GFS produced a classic high latitude high pressure blocking pattern to cause a chilly longwave trough to appear in the East U.S. in the 11-15-day period.