El Niño Could Help Ease Drought By This Winter

Dalhart Weather Review 

By Aaron Graves

The color of spring in Dalhart! The fourth dust storm
in two months made for an interesting sky Tuesday.

The sky turned various shades of brown Tuesday, thanks to yet another dust storm. I personally witnessed hues of almond, bisque, camel, and Oklahoma at various times throughout the day. The wide-spread browning of the heavens triggered a dust storm warning from the National Weather Service in Amarillo, the fourth such warning this year. 

Naturally, this would be the week I picked to review the ongoing drought. Any short-term prospects for relief look grim, but there is some good news to pass along. 

The U.S. Drought Monitor for April 22 looks as if someone spilled dark red ink across the Texas panhandle. Most of the area is listed as D4 “exceptional drought” on a scale of D0 (no drought) to D4 (worst). In fact, the 42 months from October 2010 to March 2014 are considered the driest 42 month period for the High Plains region of the Texas panhandle since 1895, this according to the Drought Monitor’s weekly summary. 

The Drought Monitor shows 12% of Texas in D4 drought conditions, most of it concentrated in the Texas panhandle. The last time we were this bad was in July of 2013. Any drought relief from last year’s late summer rains and winter snowfall has all but dried up.  

UPDATE: The Drought Monitor for April 29 now has 17% of the state in D4 drought, including the entire Texas panhandle. The report added: "U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports indicated that 78% of Texas and 72% of Oklahoma topsoil was short or very short of moisture. The Oklahoma State research station in Goodwell reported widespread crop loss and destruction, with the abandonment of all dryland winter wheat in Cimarron" county, 40 miles north of Dalhart. 

The Climate Prediction Center expects drought conditions to continue in our area through the end of July, according to a report issued April 17. However, the Texas panhandle has “equal chances” of seeing above average, below average, or normal precipitation over the next three months. That could be good news for us, but only time will tell.  

Todd Lindley, Science and Operations Officer with the Amarillo NWS, confirms the drought is deepening. He comments: “There is no strong climate signal dictating how our growing season rains will unfold this season, other than to say our current momentum is certainly favoring persistent or worsening drought through summer.”

But there is a glimmer of hope, a silver lining behind the dust storm: the return (we hope) of El Niño. “There is reason to be optimistic that the developing El Niño may eventually bring chances for increased moisture,” Lindley said. “Confidence for the development of El Niño is increasing.  Based on data from mid-April, the likelihood of El Niño during the August to December time frame is now 70 to 80%.”

El Niño refers to a warmer-than-normal Pacific Ocean. As the ocean water near the equator heats up, it helps to shift weather patterns around the world. In general, our area sees more rain. 

“It is hard to correlate El Niño to the weather at any one given location,” Lindley added, “but in general, the Southern Great Plains and the Texas Panhandle could expect to see relatively more moist and, on average, cooler temperatures during an El Niño. Interestingly, 8 out of the 10 snowiest years on record at Amarillo have occurred during El Niño.”

When might we see the benefits if an El Niño does develop as expected? 

“It is possible we could see influences of it by fall,” Lindley said, “but the more likely time frame for an El Niño to influence our weather would be during the winter.”

That is good news indeed. However, we still have to get through this summer first. Dalhart has only received 0.11” of precipitation for the month of April. Light sprinkles and spotty rain showers rolled through town Sunday. However, only a trace was recorded at the airport. The cold front that brought the sprinkles dropped our daily high temperatures from the 80's down into the 60's.  

We will begin to warm back into the 70's by Friday. Look for a high in the mid 80's on Saturday, and the mid 90's on Sunday. No rain is in the forecast. The winds should stay calm over the weekend. 

I cannot emphasize enough the need to get advance warning of bad weather. Even during a drought, severe weather is still a threat. If you haven’t already, please sign up for text message alerts at the www.r2beready.com website. For help in doing so, go back two blog posts from this one. Also, check out last week's blog about mobile apps that work like weather radios. 

Speaking of mobile apps, I have a quick update to last week’s blog: the NOAA Weather Radio HD app worked as advertised - it alerted me to the dust storm warning. To my surprise, the Intellicast radar app also sent me an alert. I was unaware push alerts were a feature of that app.  

High and low temps the past week

Apr 22: 85, 47

Apr 23: 87, 60

Apr 24: 71, 44

Apr 25: 87, 39

Apr 26: 88, 50

Apr 27: 73, 45

Apr 28: 67, 37

Thanks for reading! This blog post originally appears every Wednesday in "The County Times Two" e-mail newsletter. To subscribe, contact Robin Scott at thecountytimestwo@live.com. Any updates to the Wednesday article are usually indicated in italics on this blog. The forecast for the weekend is always updated before posting.