A novel prediction framework to forecast extreme meteorological events

Courant faculty Jonathon Weare and Ed Gerber just published a study adopting a novel prediction framework from computational chemistry to forecast extreme meteorological events. The paper, published in Monthly Weather Review, was led by Justin Finkel, a graduate student at the University of Chicago.  It presents a proof of concept study using a stochastically forced version of the classic Holton and Mass (1976) model of Sudden Stratospheric Warming events. They show the utility of a novel forecasting metric, the “committor”, which provides the ideal combination of variables for predicting SSWs in the Holton-Mass system. They also establish a method to compute it from relatively short integrations, i.e., integrations that are short relative to the time scale of the event, and much shorter than the return time scale of events.