Strong sub-seasonal wintertime cooling over East Asia and Northern Europe associated with super El Niño events

We find that this large-scale cold spell can be attributed to the concurrent super El Nino event in the tropical Pacific. Our analysis reveals that all super El Nino winters (1982/83, 1997/98, and 2015/16) were accompanied by a rapid sub-seasonal North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO)/Arctic Oscillation (AO) phase reversal from a positive to a negative state during early January, which was largely caused by the interaction of these super El Nino events with the subtropical jet annual cycle.

The NAO/AO phase transition leads to a rapidly strengthened Siberian High, which favors southward intrusions of cold air to East Asia and thus causes severe local cooling. Similar cold spells can also be detected over Northern Europe associated with the fast sub-seasonal NAO/AO phase reversal. Due to the weaker amplitude of the ENSO forcing, these sub-seasonal atmospheric responses cannot be detected for moderate El Nino events.