Dear WeatherCat drought watchers,
The July prediction for El Nino is in and it continues the forecast from last month:
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/ensodisc.htmlThe most important text is below:
Nearly all models predict El Ni?o to continue into the Northern Hemisphere winter 2015-16, with many multi-model averages predicting a strong event at its peak strength (3-month values of the Ni?o-3.4 index of +1.5oC or greater; Fig. 6). At this time, the forecaster consensus is in favor of a significant El Ni?o in excess of +1.5oC in the Ni?o-3.4 region. Overall, there is a greater than 90% chance that El Ni?o will continue through Northern Hemisphere winter 2015-16, and around an 80% chance it will last into early spring 2016 (click CPC/IRI consensus forecast for the chance of each outcome for each 3-month period).
Across the contiguous United States, temperature and precipitation impacts associated with El Ni?o are expected to remain minimal during the Northern Hemisphere summer and increase into the late fall and winter (the 3-month seasonal outlook will be updated on Thursday July 16th). El Ni?o will likely contribute to a below normal Atlantic hurricane season, and to above-normal hurricane seasons in both the central and eastern Pacific hurricane basins (click Hurricane season outlook for more).
Interesting to me is that this forecast includes an increase in the eastern Pacific hurricane basins. After a strong start, hurricanes on our side of the Pacific have been basically nonexistent. As a result, since June 11, we haven't gotten any much needed summer rains. If El Ni?o were to increase the hurricane activity near the west coast of the United States, that might bring monsoonal moisture to places that normally don't get it and start providing drought relief early.
The downside with this forecast is the feast or famine nature of it. If California is pounded by severe weather after 4 years of drought, lots of fallen trees, landslides and worse are basically a certainty. No matter what, things look rough for the western part of the United States.
Edouard