Expectations for the Coming Year By Don Day, Jr., Meteorologist A big question headed into the summer season will be the status of the La Niña weather pattern that has dominated weather patterns across the nation since the spring and summer of 2020. The colder subtropical Pacific waters have left a large part of the central and western U.S. in a drier than normal weather pattern in 2020 and into the beginning of 2021. While the impacts of La Niña are not as noticeable from the Great Lakes to the East Coast as in the central and western states, La Niña can still impact weather patterns in those areas, especially regarding an increase in severe weather and an uptick in tropical storm and hurricane activity along the Gulf and East Coast. There are areas of the nation where we have concerns about drought conditions continuing and parts of the nation that may have too much rainfall as we head in the spring and summer seasons. The forecast for
summer of 2021 will rely heavily on whether La Niña will persist, fade or head into a weak El Niño by the end of summer. All indications suggest La Niña will persist through spring, summer and early fall. If this is the case, then the tendency for drier than normal conditions over parts of the central and western states will continue. La Niña patterns usually last for around a year, but near or during solar minimums (solar minimum in early 2020), La Niña patterns can last up to two years. The adjacent graphic shows the most recent forecast for La Niña/El Niño through summer and the start of the winter season. The solid green line (average of all the modeling) stays below the zero line which indicates at least a weak La Niña will persist through summer and into the fall season and perhaps into the early 2022. If La Niña persists, even in a weaker state than in 2020, the overall patterns we observed during the summer of 2020 may continue into 2021.
WEATHER OUTLOOK 16
NATIONAL CATTLEMEN
SPRING DIRECTIONS 2021
