Russ Steele
Robyn Moormeister introduces readers to La Nina in the Union's online late edition.
Hello, La Nina
Dry weather pattern beginning to take shape, forecasters sayNevada County residents have been taking advantage of unseasonably dry, sunny weather, which could be the result of a La Nina event, some weather experts say.
La Nina strengthened last month and is approaching “moderate strength,” according to the National Weather Service. The weather pattern likely will continue into early 2008, according to the service’s Climate Prediction Center.
“A La Nina event is sometimes associated with dry conditions in the western United States,” Sacramento weather forecaster Harry Stockman said Thursday. “We are going through a dry period now. We’re supposed to have some precipitation (early next week), but then we’re dry again.”
If you want to understand the significance of the current La Nina and the potential for many more La Nina's over the next thirty years Download
this pdf (1.4Meg) file: Ocean Multi-Decadal Changes and Temperatures, by Joseph D’Aleo, CCM We are due for a multidecadal shift in the Pacifc from a warm phase to a cool phase. This shift will being Nevada County the weather we had in the 1940s to the 1970s, and bring some global cooling to all of California. From the Summary:
Multidecadal Oscillations in the Pacific and the Atlantic are acknowledged to be the result of natural processes. We have shown the warm phase of the PDO leads to more El Ninos and general warmth and the cold phase to more La Ninas and widespread coolness. The warm mode of the AMO also produces general warmth especially across northern hemispheric land masses. When you combine the two effects, you can explain much of the temperature variances of the past 110 years. Major volcanic activity can act to enhance or offset the tendencies at times.
