In article .com,
Edmund Lewis writes:
Thanks. Fascinating.

I find this sentence particularly interesting:
"During the 35 years from 1894 to 1928 inclusive, pressure over Iceland
exceeded that over the Azores only twice in December, once in January
and five times in February"

Suggests that this period suffered the same lack of winter easterlies
that we've seen in the last 10 years?

Possibly. Certainly there weren't many severe winters after 1894-5 and
prior to 1928-9. But don't forget that a negative NAO is defined in such
a way that it doesn't actually require the pressure over Iceland to be
higher than that over the Azores, just that the pressure difference
between the two should be less than the average.

One interesting thing mentioned was the so-called Bruckner (IIRC) 34
year cycle of cold winters. The next year in that cycle was 1962-3. But
1996-7 wasn't that impressive, in spite of one severe spell from
mid-December lasting till a week or so into January. Of course, you
could argue that the cycle was only approximately 34 years, and that
1995-6 was actually the matching winter, but even that wasn't too severe
by historical standards. Of course, you can always try to fit the
climate into the straitjacket of a cycle, but usually as soon as you
identify a promising candidate it seems to come to an end.
--
John Hall

"Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong."
Oscar Wilde