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    • The forecast for winter 2024 depends on the impending La Niña
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    The forecast for winter 2024 depends on the impending La Niña

    Kathleen William Posted on

    An official announcement that La Niña has formed could come as early as mid-November, when federal meteorologists release their monthly climate pattern update.

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    Despite the current mild weather, winter is still just around the corner – and a looming La Niña in the Pacific Ocean could impact the forecast for winter 2024-25.

    An official announcement that La Niña has formed could come as early as mid-November, when federal meteorologists release their monthly update on the climate pattern that will play an important role in our winter weather.

    According to the Climate Prediction Center, a typical La Niña winter in the U.S. brings cold and snow to the Northwest and unusually dry conditions to most southern states. The Southeast and the Mid-Atlantic also tend to have above-average temperatures during the La Niña winter.

    The Climate Prediction Center's latest forecast, released earlier this month, says there is a 60% chance of La Niña conditions occurring by the end of November. And once it forms, it is expected to last from January to March 2025. However, it is likely to be a weak event.

    What is La Nina?

    La Niña is a natural climate pattern characterized by cooler-than-average seawater in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean. When water cools at least 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit below average for three months, La Niña is declared.

    “Although this sounds like a small change in temperature, it could cause significant changes in weather patterns around the globe,” said AccuWeather meteorologist Brian Lada.

    It is one of the major factors affecting the weather in the United States, particularly in late fall, winter, and early spring. It is the opposite of the more familiar El Niño, which occurs when waters in the Pacific Ocean are at least 0.9 degrees warmer than average for three months.

    A mild, dry winter is expected for many in 2024-2025

    Federal forecasts said last week that most of the southern U.S. and East Coast are expected to experience above-average temperatures this winter due to the likely La Niña. Additionally, most of the southern half of the U.S. – from Southern California to the Carolinas – is expected to see less rain and snow than usual, potentially raising concerns about drought conditions.

    “This winter, an emerging La Niña is expected to impact upcoming winter patterns, particularly our precipitation forecasts,” Jon Gottschalck, head of the Climate Prediction Center’s Operational Prediction Branch, said in a statement. However, a weaker La Niña “means traditional winter impacts would be less likely to occur,” the CPC added.

    The center's forecast covers the months of December, January and February, known as meteorological winter.

    Snowy winter for the Great Lakes Northwest?

    Notoriously snowy parts of the country could be covered in snow this winter, according to the CPC's U.S. precipitation forecast. Wet-than-average conditions are most likely particularly in the Great Lakes states, the Pacific Northwest and the northern Rocky Mountains.

    And while the forecast doesn't specify how much precipitation will fall in the form of rain, ice or snow, it's quite likely that a majority of the precipitation in these cold regions will fall as snow.

    How much snow? Some of the snowiest areas in the country (and the world) are in the parts of the country that could see heavy snowfall this winter. For example, the Mount Baker ski resort in Washington state reported a world record 95 feet of snow for the entire season in the winter of 1988-89.

    Lake effect snow downwind of Lake Erie in New York “may be among the heaviest snowfalls in the world,” said Weather.com meteorologist Jonathan Erdman, who noted that “a multi-day siege of lake effect snow buried parts in November 2022.” the Buffalo area with up to 81 inches of snowfall.

    “It will still be cold this winter”

    In the south, meteorologists remind that an overall dry, mild climate forecast does not mean that winter will not happen.

    Regardless of what the long-range forecast says, there will still be cold days and periods of rain this winter, said Gary Goggins, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Birmingham, Alabama.

    “It will still be cold this winter,” he said. “There will be days and periods when it will be very cold. There will be systems coming through the state that will bring cold weather and the possibility of severe weather, just like it happens every winter.”

    What about blizzards and blizzards on the East Coast?

    The forecast released last week only predicts where above or below average temperatures and above or below average precipitation are most likely.

    This winter forecast does not specify how much precipitation will fall as rain, snow or ice, only that overall it is more or less likely. Snow forecasts depend on the strength and direction of winter storms, which generally cannot be predicted more than a week in advance, the center said.

    However, Gottschalck said the storm track for northeasterly winds along the East Coast could favor milder air for major cities in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic, which could mean more rain than snow there. However, he warned that blizzards could still occur depending on prevailing weather conditions.

    Contributor: Marty Roney, Montgomery Advertiser

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    Kathleen William
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