The links between the Madden-Julian Oscillation and European weather regimes

Abstract Skillful weather forecasting on sub-seasonal timescales is important to enable users to make cost-effective decisions. Forecast skill can be expected to be mediated by the prediction of atmospheric flow patterns, often known as weather regimes, over the relevant region. Here, we show how the Grosswetterlagen (GWL), a set of 29 European weather regimes, can be modulated by the extra-tropical teleconnection from the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO). Together, these GWL regimes represent the large-scale flow characteristics observed in the four North Atlantic-European classical weather regimes (NAE-CWRs), while individually capturing synoptic scale flow details. By matching each GWL regime to the nearest NAE-CWR, we reveal GWL regimes which occur during the transition stages between the NAE-CWRs and show the importance of capturing the added synoptic detail of GWL regimes when determining their teleconnection pattern from the MJO. The occurrence probabilities of certain GWL regimes are significantly changed 10–15 days after certain MJO phases, exhibiting teleconnection patterns similar to their NAE-CWR matches but often with larger occurrence anomalies, over fewer consecutive MJO phases. These changes in occurrence probabilities are likely related to MJO-induced changes in the persistence and transition probabilities. Other GWL regimes are not significantly influenced by the MJO. These findings demonstrate how the MJO can modify the preferred evolution of the NAE atmospheric flow, which is important for sub-seasonal weather forecasting.