La Niña continues to weaken
With current weather patterns in the hands of a La Niña episode, many will be contemplating what effect it will have over the next few months as it slowly weakens.
La Niña involves a cooling of the eastern central Pacific Ocean waters and the current episode began to develop late 2007. Like El Niño it involves a shift in normal weather patterns across the globe. It has been blamed for the cold and exceptionally wet winter weather experienced over northern and eastern parts of the US. It has also led to heavy rain and disastrous floods across eastern Australia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Mozambique and Zimbabwe as well as parts of South America.
La Niña is now said to be weakening and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology reports that it is weakening ahead of previous model predictions.
For the time being Australian meteorologists expect the wet conditions to continue across eastern parts of Australia from April to June. Across the US the impacts of La Niña tend to become less pronounced during the spring. The presence of La Niña would normally bring a more active Atlantic hurricane season so it will be interesting to see what the summer will bring.
Meanwhile the UK Met Office yesterday issued its long range weather forecast for the UK. It is predicting a typical British summer with temperatures warmer than average and rainfall near or above average.
