The National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration has released its 2022-23 Winter Weather Outlook. Earlier today NOAA issued their predictions and interactive maps on their website for this winter season. The outlook for the KGGF listening area shows more of the same through January as far as precipitation is concerned. The only part of Kansas that may receive some relief is from a line north of I-70 in North Central Kansas to the Nebraska line. The interactive map shows that area will likely see significant improvement in the drought.
NOAA’s temperature outlook over the next 3 months for SE Kansas and the 4-State area shows that it is highly likely that we should receive above-normal temperatures.
The drought and warmer temps are attributed to La Nina suppressing the convection near the date line, which causes the colder than normal water at a depth of near-surface to 200 meters in the east-central Pacific along the equator. Combine this with large areas of warmer-than-normal water temperatures in both the North Pacific and North Atlantic and that results in the present characteristics that winter La Nina brings.
NOAA will issue a new set of outlooks next month on November 17th.
