ACCUWEATHER.COM RELEASES WINTER FORECAST
Posted: Monday, October 10, 2005 at 4:32 PM EDT
by AccuWeather.com News Director Steve Penstone
The AccuWeather.com Long Range Forecast Team, led by Chief Meteorologist Joe Bastardi, has released its official Winter Forecast for 2005-2006. The forecast calls for colder-than-normal temperatures in the Northeast, with a milder-than-normal winter west of the Continental Divide.
Snowfall levels in New England and the mountains of the Pacific Northwest are expected to be above normal, while the center of the nation will see as much as half of the normal snowfall. Overall, New England will be the hardest hit, with a cold and snowy winter expected.
Active Hurricane Season
Accuweather.com bases its findings on a study of the 2005 hurricane season and other similar "hyper-hurricane" seasons, particularly 1933, 1969 and 1995. The winters that followed each of those active hurricane years were cold in the Northeast. The winter of 1995-96 was cold across the northern Plains and the Southeast. Bitter cold gripped the Midwest in the winter of 1969-70, while a severe winter settled over the Northeast in 1933-34, a winter that was unseasonably warm west of the Ohio Valley.
Active hurricane seasons are a by-product of warmer-than-normal water temperatures in the Atlantic Ocean. The warm water southeast of the U.S. drains the normal continental cooling during winter toward the Southeast. The westward shift of cold air across North America is due more to the profile in the temperate region of the Pacific Ocean.
Temperature Forecast
The forecast calls colder-than-normal temperatures (by as much as 3.5 degrees) over the Northeast. The Southwest will be warmer than usual, as much as 4 degrees warmer than the interior West. If that turns out to be true, it will continue the trend of normal to below-normal temperatures over the Northeast that started during the winter of 2000-2001 and was interrupted only once. The mid-section of the nation will have near to above-normal temperatures.
Snowfall Forecast
The Northeast has seen more snowfall than average in four of the past five winters, and that trend looks to continue again this winter. Factors in the North Atlantic leads to enough cold in the region so that even if it is drier than normal, it will snow more than normal. A warm summer usually leads to normal or above-normal snow amounts in the Great Lakes. This appears to be the idea for the eastern Lakes, but the trend may need to be extended westward.
The other area that will receive above-average snowfall is the mountains of the Pacific Northwest, a welcome change from the dry winter of 2004-2005. The assumption is that the warm water south of Alaska will push storms into the region, so that even it is milder than normal, it snows more. Snow in the Plains should be less than normal, while in the Southland, absent an El Niño, snow becomes more of a 50/50 chance.
