RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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The big question for Texas this winter isn't just whether El Niño will bring more rain. It's whether all that moisture could finally turn into snow.
After a hot, dry summer, Texans could be in for a dramatic weather reversal as a powerful El Niño takes over the winter pattern.
The catch? Texas may get plenty of the wet stuff this winter. Snow is another story.
John Nielsen-Gammon, a professor in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at Texas A&M University, told Chron he puts the odds of Texas having a wetter-than-normal cool season at about 90 percent from October through April.
"I'm a bit more confident than NOAA's Weather Prediction Center," Nielsen-Gammon said, noting that NOAA is accounting for a recent drying trend in Texas that he believes was largely driven by previous La Niña conditions.
This time around, he expects El Niño to take the wheel.
For Houston, that could mean more frequent storm systems—including more storms forming over the Gulf of Mexico and bringing the city its favorite winter combination: clouds and steady rain.
There's even a 10 to 15 percent chance Houston breaks its October-through-April rainfall record, according to Nielsen-Gammon.
That's not an insignificant possibility when you consider what's happened during past strong El Niños.
Houston's two wettest cool seasons in the past 50 years both occurred during very strong El Niños. The city recorded 43.81 inches in 2015-16 and 40.65 inches in 1991-92.
The all-time record of 44.82 inches, set in 1949-50, could even be within reach this winter, Nielsen-Gammon said.
For Houstonians who remember the Tax Day flood of 2016, the prospect of another exceptionally wet El Niño winter may not sound quite so fun.
Maybe—but El Niño isn't necessarily Houston's ticket to a snow day.
El Niño generally favors cooler weather across Texas, but Nielsen-Gammon puts the odds of a cooler-than-normal October-through-April period at only about 50-50. Two competing forces are at work: El Niño pushes temperatures cooler, while global warming pushes them warmer.
And when it comes to snow, there's an even bigger problem.
During past very strong El Niños, Central and South Texas did not see an increase in snow or freezing rain.
"To get significant snow this far south requires a strong, sustained blast of cold air from the Arctic, but Arctic temperatures tend to be much warmer than normal during an El Niño," Nielsen-Gammon said.
That's particularly bad news for Houstonians hoping to wake up to a winter wonderland.
"The cold weather in Houston during an El Niño tends to be more of the cloudy and dreary kind rather than the bitingly cold kind," he said.
This year's El Niño has a chance to be one of the strongest in recorded history, in which the combination of warm ocean temperatures and vertical wind shear across the Atlantic Ocean has brought just two named storms ( Tropical Storm Arthur and Tropical Storm Bertha ) to the United States.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reports the El Niño pattern brings more moisture to the southern portion of the United States, highlighting Amarillo and West Texas as an area that should bring "wetter, snowier conditions," as well as "cooler maximum temperatures." Farmer's Almanac reported a similar forecast this month, in which "more storms and wetter and cooler weather" are expected in the South.
Houston's largest winter snowfall total came in 1972-93, an El Niño winter in which nearly five inches of snow fell on the Bayou City, per the Houston Chronicle . "Measurable snow" was also recorded in the El Niño winter of 2009-10. Ultimately, however, tying hopes of snowfall to an El Niño winter is a fool's errand. El Niño brings a general pattern of moisture rather than the frigid temperatures and right pressure systems needed to create snow in Houston. The best bet this winter? Get your rain boots ready for plenty of puddles. Adding a jacket for any possible snow would be an unexpected bonus.
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