Tag Archives: Record Weather

New Forecast Provides Glimpse Into El Niño’s Potential U.S. Impacts

A new forecast provides an in-depth look at the weather conditions that a particularly powerful El Niño is expected to bring to the continental United States over the next three months.

The predictions were recently released by WSI, which has corporate connections to The Weather Channel. The channel analyzed the three-month outlook on its website on Monday.

El Niño is a weather pattern that occurs when part of the Pacific Ocean is warmer than usual, bringing atypical and sometimes extreme weather across the world. Many scientists, including those with NASA and World Meteorological Organization, have publicly said this year’s El Niño is shaping up to be one of the strongest instances of the pattern in the past 65 years, with NASA saying last week it may exceed the strength of the 1997-98 pattern billed as the worst on record.

According to The Weather Channel, the southern United States is generally expected to see temperatures below those typical for this time of year, while the northern states should see hotter-than-usual temperatures. The forecast indicates there may be exceptions to these tendencies, including a stretch this month where temperatures may see a more East-West divide.

El Niño is also known to impact precipitation totals.

Citing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which researches El Niño and issues its own predictions, The Weather Channel reported states on the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, as well as large chunks of the Great Plains and Southwest, should see above-average precipitation totals this winter. On the other hand, the report indicates states in the Great Lakes and Pacific Northwest, as well as those bordering Canada, may see less rain and snow than usual.

NASA warned last week that the United States likely has yet to see the full brunt of this El Niño, which has already been blamed for several extreme storms across the globe. El Niños also generate droughts in some parts and floods in others, disrupting economies and food supplies.

The forecast analyzed by The Weather Channel focused on general trends, not specific storms.

The NOAA is expected to release its next El Niño update on January 14.

Winter Storm Pushes North Pole Temperatures Past Freezing Point

The same storm system that caused widespread flooding and other extreme weather in the United States also pushed temperatures at the North Pole to abnormally high levels, according to a new report from The Washington Post.

The newspaper reported Wednesday that temperatures at the northernmost point on Earth were about 50 degrees warmer than historic averages for late December. The temperature was even above the freezing point of 32 degrees Fahrenheit at one time, according to the report.

To put that in perspective, the Post noted it was actually colder in parts of the United States on Wednesday than it was at the North Pole. Temperatures in parts of Colorado and Wyoming reached 15 degrees below zero on Wednesday, according to the National Weather Service.

NASA: Potent El Nino Shows No Signs of Slowing

The United States likely will not see the full force of a powerful El Nino until early next year and the weather phenomenon has not shown any sign of slowing down, NASA announced Tuesday.

El Nino occurs when part of the Pacific Ocean is warmer than usual, setting off a far-reaching ripple effect that brings atypical and often extreme weather throughout the world. A variety of weather experts, including those with the United Nations, have said this year’s pattern is shaping up to be one of the three strongest in the past 65 years, but NASA said that the latest satellite images suggest the United States probably has yet to see the worst of the weather.

The images show “a striking resemblance to one from December 1997,” captured during the strongest El Nino on record, according to NASA. While the National Weather Service previously said that the pattern “matured,” NASA said Tuesday that the latest images indicate El Nino “shows no signs of waning,” and the fact that some elements of the Pacific Ocean are different now than they were 18 years ago could mean the weather pattern might actually intensify.

“Although the sea surface height signal in 1997 was more intense and peaked in November of that year, in 2015, the area of high sea levels is larger,” Josh Willis, a project scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, told NASA’s website. “This could mean we have not yet seen the peak of this El Niño.”

The announcement comes in the wake of deadly flooding throughout the central United States that has sent multiple river gauges to historic levels and forced mandatory evacuations. This El Nino has already been blamed for historic flooding in coastal India, widespread wildfires in Indonesia and several crop-damaging droughts and floods across the globe, according to NASA.

NASA says it’s still not clear when El Nino will make its full presence felt in the United States, or the effects it could have. Generally, the National Weather Service has said the southeast is likely to see more precipitation and colder temperatures, while the northwest is expected to see hotter temperatures and less precipitation. However, that’s not an all-encompassing forecast, and NASA noted past El Ninos have been known to produce extreme storms such as a massive ice storm that slammed the northeast United States and parts of Canada in January 1998.

The National Weather Service has said El Nino is likely to linger into early summer.

More Flooding, Tornadoes, Snow Expected to Impact United States

More extreme weather was threatening the United States on Monday morning, as the remnants of the devastating and deadly Winter Storm Goliath continued to move eastward.

The storm system produced the floods and tornadoes that caused at least 43 deaths in recent days, according to Reuters. On Monday, thunderstorms, flooding and winter precipitation was affecting a widespread stretch of the nation, and there were even additional tornado warnings.

The National Weather Service (NWS) issued winter storm warnings in parts of eight states: Michigan, Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota, Iowa, South Dakota, Missouri and Kansas. Flood warnings or flash flood watches were in effect in parts of 15 states, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported 378 river gauges were in flood stage nationwide.

There were also active tornado watches in central Alabama and the Florida panhandle as heavy rain and storms continued their push through the area. The more serious tornado warnings had been issued in parts of those states, as well as portions of Mississippi, earlier in the morning.

Most of the 34 gauges with “major flooding” indicated were in the Great Plains, where rainfall was particularly heavy. The NWS reported that certain parts of Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Missouri received more than 10 inches of rain between noon Saturday and 8 a.m. Monday.

That’s led to record flooding in some locations.

The NOAA reported the Illinois River near Tahlequah, Oklahoma, was at 29.92 feet, already two feet above its previous record that was set back in 1950. The river was expected to rise to 31 feet.

More rain was expected to fall later in the day, which could spur additional flooding.

The Mississippi River in Chester, Illinois, is expected to see a record crest of 49.9 feet on New Year’s Day. Cape Girardeau, Missouri, is also forecast to hit a record crest of 45.5 feet that day.

In areas with colder temperatures, that precipitation was falling as snow or freezing rain.

The NWS reported that 18 different locations in New Mexico received more than a foot of snow, including a whopping 41 inches near Bonito Lake in the Sierra Blanca mountains. Many roads in the state remained closed Monday and there were “numerous” people still stranded in vehicles.

Governors in Missouri and New Mexico have declared states of emergency.

On Monday, the snow was expected to fall in the northern United States. Some regions of Wisconsin, Minnesota and Michigan could see 10 inches of snow, the NWS said.

Parts of New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New England were under winter weather advisories as the storm was expected to travel there later Monday and into Tuesday.

Messy Weather Disrupting Holiday Travel Plans

Severe weather was impacting the holiday travel plans of many Americans on Thursday morning, and threatening to impact more.

The remnants of the storm system that produced Wednesday’s deadly tornado outbreak were moving across the southeastern United States on Thursday. The National Weather Service said the system had weakened considerably, but it was still capable of producing heavy rainfall and localized severe thunderstorms throughout the Mid-Atlantic and Gulf Coast. The storms were expected to be the worst in Alabama and Georgia, but rain was falling as far north as New Jersey.

According to flight monitoring website FlightAware.com, 201 flights to or from United States destinations were cancelled as of 11:45 a.m. EST on Thursday morning. Another 1,720 were delayed. Both of those numbers had steadily risen throughout the morning.

A large percentage of the delays were the result of heavy storms at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport, the world’s busiest airport in terms of passenger traffic. FlightAware indicated 111 flights to or from the airport had been cancelled, and another 703 were delayed.

More Americans than ever before are expected to travel this Christmas season. AAA projects that 100.5 million Americans were expected to make a journey of at least 50 miles in the 12-day period that began Wednesday morning. More than 90 percent of people were expected to drive to their destinations, but 5.8 million were expected to fly. That’s an increase of .7 percent over last year, AAA reported.

Regardless of whether they were traveling or not, there’s a good chance Americans would experience record temperatures on Christmas. The National Climate Data Center reported that there have been 3,912 record daily high temperatures this month, and that trend was expected to continue Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

The Weather Channel reported temperatures in New York City reached 70 degrees early Christmas Eve morning, smashing the previous record of 63 degrees. The forecast was calling for a high of 64 degrees on Christmas, which would tie a 33-year-old record.

Still, some Western parts of the country were expected to see a White Christmas as Winter Storm Goliath arrived Thursday and continued to dump snow throughout Christmas and well into next week.

The National Weather Service had issued winter storm warnings in northern and central California, southeastern Oregon, northern Idaho, eastern Utah and western Colorado. The service had also issued winter weather advisories in parts of those states, as well as Washington, Arizona, Montana and Nevada. The service was also warning of the possibility of avalanches in Idaho, Utah and Colorado.

The Weather Channel reported that the storm could bring more than a foot of snow to higher elevations by Saturday night, though most of the affected areas are expected to see fewer than five inches. However, the channel’s meteorologists say the storm may intensify over the weekend, and early projections show that Goliath could dump up to a foot of snow over the Great Plains before next Tuesday.

Weather Experts Predict 2016 Could Be Hottest Year in History

British meteorologists said Thursday that 2015 is on track to be the warmest year in history, and forecasts indicate that next year could be even hotter.

Britain’s Met Office predicts the average global temperature is expected to be between 1.2 and 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than a 30-year average, with a “central estimate” of 1.5 degrees.

Temperatures in the first 10 months of this year were about 1.3 degrees hotter than that 30-year average, the Met Office said. If that trend continued, 2015 would be the hottest year on record.

“This forecast suggests 2016 is likely to be at least as warm, if not warmer,” Chris Folland, a research fellow at the Met Office, said in a statement accompanying the forecasts.

The 30-year average the Met Office cites covers global temperatures from 1961-1990. In those years, the average temperature on Earth was 57.2 degrees. But the Met Office said that human-induced climate change, as well as naturally occurring weather phenomena like El Nino, have factored into the recent observed temperatures, along with the forecasts for the future.

“This forecast suggests that by the end of 2016 we will have seen three record, or near-record years in a row for global temperatures,” Adam Scaife, who heads long-range prediction at the Met Office, said in a statement.

The Met Office said the forecast doesn’t include “random events” like volcanic eruptions, which could cause temperatures to cool temporarily. It also said that while it doesn’t expect the run of record-setting years to continue indefinitely, the forecast does indicate how climate change “can combine with smaller, natural fluctuations” to push temperatures to unprecedented levels.

The latest forecast comes on the heels of last week’s landmark COP21 agreement in which nearly 200 countries pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in an attempt to keep average global temperatures from rising to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above pre-industrial levels. Scientists have publicly warned that eclipsing that long-feared threshold could yield catastrophic results.

Rare Tornado Brings Record Winds to Australia

A rare tornado ripped through Sydney on Wednesday morning, reportedly bringing the fastest winds ever recorded in that region of Australia and leaving a wake of destruction in its path.

The Sydney Morning Herald reported the storm featured wind gusts of 132 mph, which smashed the record for the state of New South Wales. The previous high of 106 mph was set back in 1974.

The tornado occurred as the Australian Bureau of Meteorology issued severe thunderstorm warnings for the region surrounding Sydney, Australia’s largest and perhaps most famous city.

Westpac Life Saver, a search and rescue helicopter service in New South Wales, shared photos on social media that showed the damage in Kurnell, a Sydney suburb. The pictures showed numerous downed trees, widespread debris and several homes that were missing roof shingles.

Other photographs shared on social media showed large hailstones, some the size of golf balls.

The Bureau of Meteorology reported the thunderstorms dumped more than three inches of rain in one hour in Nowra, about four hours south of Sydney. The precipitation in Sydney was significant enough to trigger some flash flooding, according to the Sydney Morning Herald.

The BBC reported no one was significantly injured in the tornado, though some properties were so severely damaged that authorities deemed them unlivable. Australian media outlet 9News reported officials are warning of the threat of asbestos in debris, particularly from older homes.

Crews were working to restore power to about 20,000 customers, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Winter Storm Echo’s Heavy Snow Shuts Down Flights, Closes Roads

Parts of eight Western states were under winter storm warnings on Tuesday morning as a powerful winter storm continued to travel across the United States.

The National Weather Service issued the warnings in Utah, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska as Winter Storm Echo moved east.

Meteorologists warned the storm would bring more heavy snowfall and high wind gusts, and could spur hazardous travel conditions. It’s already dumped lots of snow in the states it passed.

The National Weather Service reported the storm brought 28.1 inches of snow to Bountiful, Utah, between 6 a.m. Saturday and 7 a.m. Tuesday, and more snow was expected to fall later Tuesday. About 26.3 inches were recorded near Atlanta, Idaho, and 23.3 inches were observed near Corbin, Montana. Double-digit totals were also seen in parts of Colorado and Wyoming.

In some cases, the snowfall totals were record.

The Salt Lake Tribune reported that 6.9 inches of snow fell at the city’s airport Sunday, smashing the previous single-day record of 5.8 inches. The previous mark was set in 1922.

Winter Storm Echo was also snarling travel, including some significant developments.

The snow forced the cancellation of 315 flights to and from Denver International Airport on Tuesday, according to the flight monitoring website FlightAware. Another 212 were delayed.

In Wyoming, the state Department of Transportation shut down a roughly 108-mile eastbound stretch of Interstate 80 between Rock Springs and Rawlins due to “winter conditions.” The road was also closed in both directions between Cheyenne and Laramie, some 50 miles apart.

While the storm was no longer pummeling the West Coast, it certainly made an impact.

The storm’s highest recorded snowfall total was 33 inches in Willamette Pass, Oregon. Echo also deposited 20-plus inches in mountainous California and Nevada, and a foot in Jacob Lake, Arizona. The storm dropped rain on warmer areas, including 8.71 inches in parts of California.

That rain was being blamed for at least two deaths.

In California, CBS San Francisco reported that the parents of two young children died when their car rolled over multiple times and tumbled down an embankment off Interstate 580 on Saturday. Fire officials reportedly said the vehicle might have hydroplaned on slick roads there.