Houston is experiencing El Nino, but whatโs the difference between that and La Nina?
If the weather in Houston has felt odd to you over the last few months, youโre not alone. Much of the southern part of the United States, especially Houston, have been experiencing the weather phenomenon known as El Nino.
An early hurricane heads-up for Houston and Texas
For 20 years now, engineer Dale Link has issued a broad hurricane forecast for the United States (and all over the world) indicating not โhow manyโ hurricanes weโll have in a given season, but where those storms have a 50-50 chance of making landfall.
NOAA forecasts drought improvement across Southeast, Gulf Coast and Texas amid ongoing El Nino
This year, El Nino is in place heading into winter for the first time in four years, driving the outlook for warmer-than-average temperatures for the northern tier of the continental United States, according to NOAAโs U.S. Winter Outlook released last week by the Climate Prediction Center โ a division of the National Weather Service.
Meteorologists say Earth sizzled to a global heat record in June and July has been getting hotter
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says an already warming Earth steamed to its hottest June on record, smashing the old global mark by nearly a quarter of a degree, with global oceans setting temperature records for the third straight month.
Flirting with climate danger: UN forecasts 2 in 3 chance of briefly hitting key heat limit soon
The United Nations' weather agency says there's a two-out-of-three chance that the world will reach the internationally accepted global temperature threshold for limiting the worst effects of climate change sometime in the next five years.
One early hurricane forecast
Very few seasonal hurricane forecasts come out before April simply because the skill level is not there. About all you can go on now is water temperature and, sometimes, the forecast for La Nina/El Nino. Saying that, a group out of England called Tropical Storm Risk issued their first 2023 Hurricane forecast last December (!) and below youโll see they are calling for a fairly average season citing stronger trade winds last summer and noting that historically a year that follows three La Nina seasons usually comes in about average.
La Nina equals triple tropical trouble!
Iโve been talking all year about La Nina, that cooler-than-normal water in the Pacific, which basically means dry weather for Texas and a lack of upper level winds across the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. Its opposite, El Nino, is warmer than normal Pacific water which creates those upper level winds and those winds can shear apart developing tropical systems. So El Nino is El Amigo in that regard! La Nina not so much.
What to know about our Warmest Year!
Yesterday, NASA released the hot details of our record-tying 2020 which is literally in a โdead heatโ with 2016. However, that has switched now and cooler water is out there, known as La Nina. Speaking of which, Whatโs up with La Nina? The red line below is the model consensus for La Nina and itโs below that middle black line. No changes in La NIna until summerUnfortunately, that is also the height of hurricane season and with traffic snarling again, look for a warm 2021.
โWeโll be with you to get through this seasonโ: Here is Frank Billingsleyโs letter to Houstonians as hurricane season begins
Once again our hurricane season has begun BEFORE June 1st (Tropical Storm Arthur & Bertha) and once again all the official forecasts are coming in with an above average forecast. Average is 12 storms, 6 of those becoming hurricanes and 3 of those becoming major--the National Hurricane Center has a forecast that potentially doubles that to 12 hurricanes and 6 majors! Hurricane Harvey did hit to our south in Rockport as a Cat 4 and we certainly felt the horrible effects of a flooding hurricane. So we can split hairs all we want, the bottom line is there is no reason to think the Gulf won't have an active season. You'll likely have to stay put unless you live in a surge zone and then you'll need a place on higher ground.