You may have heard of La Niña and El Niño having a huge impact on weather patterns, especially in the winter when we get most of our rain and snow.
For La Niña, sea surface temperatures are colder than normal in the Pacific near the equator. And a cold ocean means less evaporation, less clouds building in that area, affecting the jet stream aloft that carries storm systems around the world.
Right now, we're in the third year in a row of a La Niña pattern, each with varying effects on how much rain we got because of the position of the jet stream.
El Niño years tend to be the opposite. Warm sea surface temperatures create more evaporation, more clouds, and a very active storm pattern that sends more rain across the southern U.S.
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The Bay Area, being on the very edge of that subtropical jet, could go either way. And new data out from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or NOAA, reveals that as global temperatures rise, El Niño events may boost that warmth even further, possibly causing more extreme droughts or rainfall events around the world.
The outlook for the coming fall is for El Niño to develop.
