The chances that a La Niña will die down at the end of California’s rainy season are increasing, offering some hope that dry conditions in the western United States will ease.
The chances of temperatures in the Pacific Ocean returning to normal levels between February and April are 71%, ending a La Niña phenomenon that has persisted for three years, according to a forecast released Thursday by the Center for Weather prediction.
La Niña has dominated global weather, causing mild winters in the southern US, drought in the west and parched crops in parts of Argentina and Brazil.
More than 99% of California is affected by drought, according to the US Drought Monitor. The state receives almost all of its annual rain and snow between November and April, with most of it falling between December and February.
California has started winter well, with snowpacking in the Sierra Nevada, although the same was true last year until La Niña interrupted precipitation for the rest of the winter, leaving the state and the western US mired in drought.
La Niña occurrences in three consecutive years have occurred three times since 1950 and the phenomenon, marked by colder-than-normal waters in the equatorial Pacific, has never occurred four years in a row in modern records.
In addition to increasing the chances that the Pacific will return to normal, there is a chance that the ocean will warm sometime between July and September, a phenomenon known as El Niño.
With information from Bloomberg Línea