Snowsports Forecast

El Niño Heralds Dry Winter

By Richard Martin, 12-06-06

	Yellow means no snow.

Uh-oh.

That was my first thought when I checked the NOAA predictions for the El Niño event that has been forming over the last few months in the eastern Pacific. For residents of the high country, El Niño can mean only one thing: a dry, warm winter.

That's what happened in 2002-03, the last El Niño, when it barely snowed from Dec. 1 to Feb. 28, and then dumped almost four feet along the Front Range in a March blizzard. And a less extreme version of that is what researchers are now predicting for this winter.

That means that you'd better enjoy the recent snowfall that's allowed Rocky Mountain ski resorts to get the season off to a big start. Cause there ain't gonna be much more till late February, if the scientists are right.

The early-season snowfall, in fact, is itself typical of an El Niño winter. The term refers to an unusual upwelling of warm water along the equatorial regions of the Eastern Pacific, which affects weather patterns worldwide. Temperatures in the area reached up to 2° Centigrade above normal in November, which heralds a "moderate" El Niño.

Characteristic effects of El Niño include warmer-than-average temperatures over western and central Canada, wetter-than-average conditions along the Gulf Coast, drier-than-average weather in the Ohio Valley and the Pacific Northwest, and, yes, a mostly warm, dry winter in the Rockies.

If you want a more reassuring forecast you can turn to the Farmer's Almanac, which uses its "top-secret formula" to predict "widespread cold from coast to coast, especially for the western sections of the country," and plenty of snow, particularly for the Pacific Northwest and New England.

I think I'll get my skiing in early.

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