NOAA Reports La NIÑA Is Developing

<snip>

September 6, 2007 — Scientists with NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, in today’s release of its monthly El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Diagnostic Discussion, say that La Niña is on its way. (Click NOAA image for larger view of observed sea surface temperatures on August 29, 2007. Please credit “NOAA.”)

“While we can’t officially call it a La Niña yet, we expect that this pattern will continue to develop during the next three months, meeting the NOAA definition for a La Niña event later this year,” said Mike Halpert, acting deputy director of the Climate Prediction Center in Camp Springs, Md.

La Niña refers to the periodic cooling of ocean surface temperatures in the central and east-central equatorial Pacific that occur every three to five years. NOAA declares the onset of a La Niña event when the three-month average sea-surface temperature departure exceeds -0.5 degrees Celsius (-0.9 degrees Fahrenheit) in the east-central equatorial Pacific .

And...

With La Niña developing, seasonal forecasters expect wetter-than-normal conditions in the Pacific Northwest and drier-than-normal conditions in the already drought-stricken southwestern U. S. this Fall.

“These conditions also reinforce NOAA’s August forecast for an above normal Atlantic hurricane season,” said Gerry Bell, Ph.D., NOAA’s lead seasonal hurricane forecaster.

<snip>

Link: http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2007/s2914.htm



Looks like it might be a wet Winter here in NorCal.

:shrug:

continued severe drought in the SW?

:kick:

QUOTE: La Niña refers to the periodic cooling of ocean surface temperatures in the central and east-central equatorial Pacific that occur every three to five years. UNQUOTE

In fact, El Nino and La Nina were once in every 1,000 year events --
Global Warming has created this increased activity