An absence of El Niño will mark the upcoming summer. Learn potential consequences for the United States.
The disappearance of El Niño doesn't guarantee relief from the heat. On the contrary, experts believe it could mean the opposite.
How this summer's weather might be
El Niño is a natural climate pattern characterized by warmer than normal ocean temperatures in the equatorial Pacific. When the water cools down, it's called La Niña. Both phases have an impact on weather around the world.
By June, it's expected that the ocean temperatures will be close to normal, indicating a neutral phase, before La Niña takes hold in early summer, according to the NOAA Climate Prediction Center.
The strength of El Niño or La Niña's effect on US weather isn't the same in every situation and depends on the power of these phenomena and the season itself.
El Niño or La Niña's influence on US weather isn't as evident during the summer as it is during the winter, especially during the transition between the two phases.
Temperature differences between the tropics and North America are greater in the winter, allowing the jet stream to become potent and impactful, reliably pushing storms into certain areas of the US.
However, in the summer, temperature difference between the two regions isn't as significant, lessening the obvious effect on US weather.
We can understand what could happen this summer by looking at prior summers with comparable conditions.
To put it simply: It's not a cool summer forecast.
The summer of 2016 was one of the hottest on record in the Lower 48. La Niña was present by mid-summer and followed a very powerful El Niño winter.
The year 2020 had a similar story: La Niña formed mid-summer following a weak El Niño winter and still resulted in one of the hottest summers on record and the most active hurricane season on record.
There's the added factor of these climate phenomena occurring amidst a warming world, raising the bar for extreme heat potential.
"This isn't your grandmother's transition out of El Niño – we’re in a much warmer world, so the impacts will be different," said Michelle L’Heureux, a climate scientist at the Climate Prediction Center. "We're seeing the consequences of climate change."
Summer predictions for the US are bringing the heat this season.
Temperatures are expected to be above average across the entire Lower 48. Only parts of the Dakotas, Minnesota, and Montana hold an equal chance of experiencing near-average, above- or below-normal temperatures.
A significant portion of the West is likely to experience warmer weather than usual. This forecast coincides with decades of climate tendencies.
Summers have seen more warming in the West than in any other region of the US since the early 1990s. Phoenix is an example of this, as its average July temperature last year was record-breaking at 102.7 degrees. It was also the deadliest year on record for heat in Maricopa County, where Phoenix is located.
Troubling trends are also foreseen in the precipitation forecasts for certain areas of the West and the central US.
Large chunks of the West and central US are expected to be drier than normal this summer. The dryness, combined with the above-normal heat, which intensifies the dryness, could lead to new or worsening drought.
Contrastingly, wetter than normal conditions are predicted in the eastern half of the US. Stormy weather may be a steady companion for many regions on the East Coast – the only question is whether it comes from typical rain and thunderstorms or tropical activity, which won't be clear for months.
A severe summer likely in the water as well
Heat isn't the only concern this summer.
The strengthening La Niña conditions, combined with ocean temperatures that have been record-high for over a year, could intensify the Atlantic hurricane season.
A warming world provides more fuel for more tropical activity and stronger storms. La Niña tends to produce favorable atmospheric conditions that enable storms to form and maintain themselves in the Atlantic.
Early this month, forecasters at Colorado State University released their most active initial forecast to date.
"We anticipate a well above-average probability for major hurricanes making landfall along the continental United States coastline and in the Caribbean," the group said in a news release.
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Source: edition.cnn.com
