Long-lead seasonal forecast - where do we stand?

The performance of five ENSO prediction systems are examined: two are dynamical; one is a hybrid coupled model; and two are statistical. With increasing physical understanding, dynamically based forecasts have the potential to become more skillful than purely statistical ones. At a lead time of 6 months, the SST forecasts have an overall correlation skill in the 0.60s for 1982-93, which easily outperforms persistence and is regarded as useful. Both types of forecasts are not much better than local higher-order autoregressive controls. However, continual progress is being made in understanding relations among global oceanic and atmospheric climate-scale anomaly fields.