El Nino or La Nina

El Nino or La Nina

David Sparks Ph.D.
David Sparks Ph.D.
El Nino or La Nina? Given our latest weather patterns and knowing how important snowpack is to all of us west of the Rockies, I called National Weather Service hydrologist in Boise, Troy Lundquist and asked him to clarify. "We are currently in a La Nina phase and that has to do with the sea surface temperatures over the central and eastern Pacific Ocean near the equator. The sea surface temperatures are cooler than normal in a La Nina and those are the conditions we are under right now and the reason we keep track of the La Nina or the El Nino which is the opposite which means sea surface temperatures are warmer than normal in that region of the Pacific Ocean is because that has an impact on our jet stream and the large scale weather patterns that impact North America. Scientists like to study those so that we can keep track of whether we are in either one of those patterns. Okay. We are presently in a La Nina, that is correct. What is the impact of La Nina on the northwest? Typically, we see over the past decades they have been studying this phenomenon, we see cooler than normal temperatures over the Northwest and above normal precipitation. Tell me the impact in terms of snowpack. Since it is during the winter time and since we see those cooler than normal temperatures and above normal precipitation, you would logically expect to see above normal snowpack over the winter."
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