Powerful El Niño! What That Means For Minnesota This Winter
In my perfect world, our winters would be full of snow, free of wind, and temps would never drop below 30. I love getting outdoors in the winter and playing in the snow with my kids, but I hate the extreme cold and nasty wind chills that we experience in Minnesota.
Meteorologists with NOAA recently updated their winter outlook for Minnesota and said we'll likely experience a powerful El niño this winter which will definitely impact our temps and the amount of snow we receive.
What is El Niño?
El Niño can have a significant effect on our winter weather. NOAA says, "The warmer waters (off the west coast) cause the Pacific jet stream to move south of its neutral position."
The change in the jet stream leads to a dryer and warmer winter for some parts of the county and a wetter than normal winter for other regions.
Powerful El Niño! What This Means For Minnesota This Winter
El Niño is good news for all of us who don't like brutal cold temps.
NOAA says our region should experience warmer than average temps this winter. In fact, the entire northern part of the country appears to be in for a mild winter.
Minnesota could see snow as early as next week according to some recent forecast models, but El Niño is generally bad news if you like snowmobiling, sledding, building snowmen, snowshoeing, or skiing because it usually means we're going to have a drier winter with less than-average snow.
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Gallery Credit: Dunken