El Nino Making For Some Strange Weather
After causing a quiet Atlantic hurricane season, El Nino has been up to its old tricks again for the winter season. El Nino has been causing tons of rain and storminess across California in places like Sacramento and down to Los Angeles, making for flooding and landslides. Up to the west coast of Canada, its been warmer and drier than average. This has been causing big problems for hosting the skiing events at the winter Olympics. All the way from the mid-Atlantic to the Deep South, frequent arctic outbreaks have been pushing through and we’ve seen snow in places like Jackson, MS and Atlanta, GA. We’ve even seen record amounts of the white stuff in places like Baltimore and Washington, DC.
An Average El Nino Winter, Image: NOAA
El Nino occurs when the waters of the western equatorial Pacific warm above normal. This causes adjustments in large-scale seasonal weather patterns. We’ve been in a moderate El Nino over the past couple of months with the central and western Pacific running at least 1.0 degree C above normal.
Latest Sea Surface Temperature Anomalies, Image: NOAA
ElNino, although it is forecast to be gradually weakening, is predicted to stick around through spring. That means if you haven’t liked the weather you’ve been seeing, you might have to get used to it a little longer.
3-month Precipitation Outlook, Image: NOAA
On the image above, green denotes probability of wetter than normal and brown denotes probability of drier than normal weather.
3-month Temperature Probability, Image: NOAA
On the image above, red denotes probability of warmer than normal and blue denotes probability of cooler than normal weather.