The U.S. Climate Prediction Center (CPC) now says La Niña is favored to continue through the Northern Hemisphere winter, with 91% odds it will persist through the September-November timeframe and 54% chances it lasts through January-March 2023. CPC says, “There is an interesting split in the dynamical versus statistical model forecasts, with the latter set suggesting La Niña will persist longer, through January-March 2023. At this time, the forecaster consensus sides with the statistical models, although there is still large uncertainty over how long La Niña will last and when it will transition to ENSO-neutral.” CPC gives slightly greater than two-third odds of ENSO-neutral conditions during the U.S. spring and early summer next year.
As we reported Wednesday, World Weather noted shifts in CPC’s ENSO model runs, saying: “The significance of this new forecast is huge for several areas in the world, but first on the list is South America. The longer La Niña lingers the higher the potential will be for another less-than-ideal South America growing season and the higher the potential will be for too much rain to fall in eastern Australia. India will likely have another wet winter and dryness may be an issue again in the central United States during the spring of 2023 if La Niña lasts too long. If La Niña dissipates in the middle of winter some of the U.S. weather concerns should diminish or dissipate and that is a real possibility in 2023.”