Recap and Forecast, Southeast Colorado Climate Info

 

Summer of 2019 Climate Review 

June was a roller coaster month for weather across Colorado, with a few warm and dry spells followed by unseasona-bly cold and strong weather systems that brought rain, mountain snow and severe storms across the area. Accumu-lating snowfall was recorded across the high peaks on June 22nd, the first full day of Summer! High pressure aloft devel-oped across the region bringing a period of summer warmth for the last week of the month.

July of 2019 saw temperatures rise to more “summer-like” conditions across most of south-central and southeast Colorado. In addition, bouts of monsoonal moisture brought bursts of heavy rainfall along with a few rounds of severe thunderstorms throughout the month.

August of 2019 was generally hot and dry across south-central and southeast Colorado, as upper level high pressure persisted across the Desert Southwest and Four Corners region limiting the amount of monsoonal moisture moving in-to the region.

For the Summer of 2019 as a whole, generally above normal temperatures and below normal precipitation were expe-rienced across south-central and southeast Colorado, except for pockets of slightly below normal temperatures and above normal precipitation.

By Mark Wankowski

 

2019-2020 Winter Weather Outlook

So what can we expect this Winter across southern Colorado? The answer can be difficult to predict, but there are several factors that we can be certain of. Temperatures look to remain warmer than nor-mal through the winter months. This is due to a combination of factors; expected El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) conditions, projected storm path, and overall climate trends.

Expected precipitation trends are a bit tougher. The Climate Prediction Center believes the first half of the Winter will see wetter than normal conditions into December, with equal chances of above or be-low normal condition into the Spring months. I agree with the wetter than normal conditions through December due to a few reasons. First is ENSO. Current model forecasts have temperature anomalies in the NINO3.4 region of the Central Pacific remaining neutral, but on the warmer side with anomalies roughly around 0.3°C through the Spring months. The only outlier model is the NASA model which has anomalies on the negative side of neutral. With the consensus on the warmer side, this should lead to a more favorable storm track across the Rockies.

By Kyle Mozley

 

Filed Under: City of LamarCountyEnvironmentFeaturedMedia ReleaseWeather

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