El Nino takes aim at West Coast

For this area, the El Niño would lead to above-average temperatures and fewer winter storms than is normal.

Bill Patzert, a climatologist with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, and other climate experts say warming sea surface temperatures coupled with westerly wind bursts are signals that El Nino right now is stronger than it was in 1997-98, which were among the state’s wettest years on record. The last time it was this strong was during the winter of 1997-78, and that ended up being the 7th warmest on record for Chicago, according to the National Weather Service. The report also says there’s an 86 percent chance it will last into early spring. “But it’s still just one piece of the puzzle”. The forecasters said they are planning on a wetter than usual winter in the South and on the East Coast up to New England. He said the current El Nino likely will rival ones in 1997-1998, 1982-83 and 1972-73.

In July, UC Irvine hydrologist Amir Aghakouchaktold CBS Los Angeles that the predicted El Niño rains could result in excessive stress on levies, roads and hillsides that have started to dry and crack in California’s historic drought.

“It’s important to bear in mind that the correlation between El Nino and precipitation are far from flawless, even in places with relatively high correlations such as Southern California and Arizona”, Werner said. This year’s warming is actually having some climatologists nickname it a possible Super El Nino. Browning says. “We haven’t really seen that in other El Nino’s”.

The desire for spectacular rain and snowfall is perhaps greatest in agricultural areas like Kings County that rely on water to keep the economy going. “The one constant with Mother Nature is that she’s always changing”, Jacobsen said. It could bring drenching rain to Southern California by the end of the year, but it is not expected to be enough to correct the conditions from the four year drought.

However, Kevin Werner, NOAA’s director of western region climate services, said there is no correlation between an El Nino event and added precipitation to the central and northern parts of the state, which have critically low levels of snowpack to feed rivers downstream.