By the AgWeb.com editors
It’s been the talk of the coffee shop – scientists have been forecasting the development of El Niรฑo for months and issued the first El Niรฑo Watch on April 13. In the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s monthly outlook released on Thursday, forecasters issued an El Niรฑo Advisory, meaning El Niรฑo conditions are now present and expected to gradually strengthen into the winter.
WHAT IS EL NIรO?
El Niรฑo is associated with a band of warm ocean water that develops near the equator in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean, but the impacts on the climate extend far beyond. The natural climate phenomenon occurs on average every two to seven years.
“Depending on its strength, El Niรฑo can cause a range of impacts, such as increasing the risk of heavy rainfall and droughts in certain locations around the world,” says Michelle L’Heureux, climate scientist at the Climate Prediction Center. “Climate change can exacerbate or mitigate certain impacts related to El Niรฑo . For example, El Niรฑo could lead to new records for temperatures, particularly in areas that already experience above-average temperatures during El Niรฑo.”
El Niรฑo’s influence on the U.S. is expected to be weak during the summer months and then become more pronounced in late fall through spring. By winter, there is an 84% chance of greater than a moderate strength El Niรฑo, and a 56% chance of a strong El Niรฑo developing.
Typically, moderate to strong El Niรฑo conditions during the fall and winter result in wetter-than-average conditions from southern California up the Gulf Coast and drier-than-average conditions in the Pacific Northwest and Ohio Valley. El Niรฑo winters also bring better chances for warmer-than-average temperatures across the northern tier of the country.
While most headlines highlight how El Niรฑo can bring historic heat around the globe, agricultural meteorologist Eric Snodgrass says it also tends to bring favorable growing conditions for crops in the Midwest.
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