Prediction of summer central England temperature from preceding North Atlantic winter sea surface temperature

A potentially useful predictive relationship has been found between the North Atlantic sea-surface temperature anomaly (SSTA) pattern in winter and the subsequent summer (July–August) central England temperature (CET) in England. This relationship can be seen in timewise correlation maps between CET and gridded SSTA. The SSTA pattern which correlates well with CET can be represented by an eigenvector. A regression equation was then established to predict subsequent summer CET from the strength of the eigenvector, which produced correlation skill of about 0·5 at a lead time of 4 months.