Weather forecasters from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration released their latest outlook for the United States on Thursday, and there’s at least one piece of hopeful news for a state that’s already had a wild year weather-wise: California.
The news
The giant mounds of snow left behind by this winter’s powerful storms in the Sierra Nevada have raised concerns about the flooding that could result if all that frozen water starts to melt and go downhill.
But according to NOAA’s latest forecasts, temperatures from May through July are very likely to be in line with historical averages in California and Nevada. For May, much of California could be even cooler than usual, the agency said. This could mean that snowmelt would be more gradual than abrupt, more beneficial to water supplies than destructive to homes and farms.
“The picture is relatively optimistic compared to what it could be,” said Andrew Schwartz, chief scientist at the Central Sierra Snow Laboratory, part of the University of California, Berkeley.
“We don’t see very warm spells yet that would worry us,” he said. “And the hope is that when we see those — or if we see them — they’ll be later in the season when the snow pack isn’t as big.”
The bigger picture
Global weather patterns are in the middle of a major transition. For the past three years, La Niña conditions have prevailed over the Pacific, contributing to drier and warmer weather in the southern half of the United States. Now this all-important factor in global climate is shifting into its opposite phase: El Niño.
According to NOAA’s latest forecasts, there is a greater than 60 percent chance that El Niño will develop between May and July. The probability that it will form between August and October is greater than 80 percent.
This shift means different things to different places, but in general, scientists expect the arrival of El Niño to herald higher temperatures on Earth. La Niña provided cooling compensation for the planet’s steady warming caused by greenhouse gas emissions. But even that wasn’t enough to prevent many parts of the world from experiencing near-record warming in recent years.
For example, Europe had its second-warmest year on record recorded in 2022. Globally, by land and sea, last month was the second-warmest March since records began in 1850, NOAA said Thursday. The amount of sea ice around both poles in March was the second lowest since records began in 1979.
What’s next
Between May and July, NOAA expects temperatures to be above normal across much of the eastern and southern United States, particularly along the Gulf Coast and Atlantic Coast. The weather is wetter than average in the Southeast.
With conditions over the Pacific Ocean in a “neutral” state, meaning neither El Niño nor La Niña is happening, there’s a wider-than-normal range of possible conditions that could arise, said Scott Handel, a meteorologist with NOAA Climate Change. Prediction Center.
“In general, there is more uncertainty than usual in precipitation forecasts in much of the country,” he said.
