'Warmer-Than-Average' Winter Forecast for Northern US As El Niño Sets In

The upcoming winter season is expected to be warmer than normal for some parts of the U.S., according to climate experts with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

A U.S. Winter Outlook published Thursday by the NOAA's Climate Prediction Center points to strengthening El Niño conditions as an explanation for the warmer temperatures expected to be felt in the northern U.S.

Maps shared by the NOAA on X, formerly Twitter, identify Northern California, Oregon, Washington and Maine, as well as parts of Vermont, New Hampshire, Idaho, Montana, Alaska and Hawaii, as having a 50 to 60 percent chance of above-average temperatures from December 2023 through February 2024. A large swath of land in the continental U.S. stretching beneath these regions is expected to have at least a 33 percent chance of above-normal winter temperatures.

Near-normal winter temperatures are expected in the Central U.S., with much of the surrounding regions expected to have equal chances of experiencing normal winter temperatures.

The NOAA's Climate Prediction Center first declared El Niño's arrival in June. Climate scientists said this will be the first winter in four years that El Niño will impact seasonal weather conditions.

El Niño triggers warmer-than-normal Pacific Ocean surface temperatures, often resulting in warmer temperatures overall. In the U.S., El Niño conditions are expected to gain strength in the late fall and are forecast to last through the spring.

Precipitation also tends to be more prominent amid El Niño due to the "enhanced southern jet stream and associated moisture often present during strong El Niño events," the chief of the Climate Prediction Center's Operational Prediction Branch, Jon Gottschalck, said in the NOAA's Thursday weather outlook. This winter, NOAA's forecast says above-normal precipitation is expected in northern Alaska and in many parts of the Southern U.S.

In Florida and along parts of the Gulf Coast and the Mid-Atlantic, above-normal amounts of precipitation are also expected. Florida's forecast is largely due to the anticipation of impacts from a subtropical jet stream, Gottschalck said during a Thursday NOAA webinar. The NOAA pointed Newsweek to comments made during the webinar when reached for comment on Thursday.

While several areas are expected to experience warmer-than-normal winters, these predictions don't mean that cold and snowy conditions won't pop up in some regions. Jet stream pressures can fuel storms that develop along the East Coast, which in turn can strengthen into snowstorms, Gottschalck told reporters—especially in the Northeast.

NOAA's winter weather predictions follow a summer that set several temperature records. Previous global records began falling in June, when climate scientists said the world experienced its hottest June on record. July, August and September followed by setting similar global records for their respective months. July set an additional record as the world's hottest month ever recorded.