FEELING THE EL NINO EFFECT
2016 COULD BE EVEN WARMER THAN 2015
Much of 2015’s weather and climate patterns were influenced by El Nino, one of the strongest on record. Turns out 2016 might also be the same — or, at least, the first few months.
“A strong El Nino is in place and if it continues, and we think it will, it will exert a strong influence over the weather this winter,” says David Phillips, senior climatologist for Environment Canada.
Western Canada, he adds, will be in a “much more difficult situation” than in 2015 if El Nino continues.
Moisture levels in big swaths of the Prairies still haven’t been recharged after the paltry rains of 2015, “so if there is less than usual or not enough precipitation in winter and spring . . . it could exacerbate the situation for agriculture” in 2016, Phillips says.
In Saskatchewan, the crops sucked up ground moisture from the previous year “but now they have no reserve . . . so winter precipitation is vital.”
There is a good chance, says Phillips, that as El Nino winds die away in the spring, the Atlantic hurricane season will come back. “It could be rip-roaring.”
This winter in Canada will be a bit of a flip-flop, says Brett Anderson, a senior meteorologist with U.S.-based AccuWeather who specializes in Canadian forecasts. Western Canada will probably be drier and milder while eastern Canada will be colder and stormier, especially Quebec and the Maritimes.
And the spring?
Again, thanks to El Nino, it will be a milder and maybe even drier spring across Canada, he says. “We are looking at some computer models and they are leaning toward a drier spring across Ontario. I suspect we are heading for a drier summer than usual too.”
Overall, Anderson says, there is a chance that 2016 will be warmer than 2015.
“A lot of it is due to El Nino; it’s warmer than what we started with in 2015,” says Anderson. “2016 will be really warm, if not the warmest.”
Finally, a bleak word on oceans.
Globally, ocean water temperatures are the warmest since the 1880s, Anderson says. “That means we are seeing a lot of heat, the oceans are absorbing a lot of it. I don’t see that changing at all next year; they will be abnormally warm next year too.” Raveena Aulakh