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\n As a taste of fall<\/a> gives much of the United States a break from a hot, humid summer<\/a>, some forecasters are already skipping ahead to winter, and a possible homecoming for an important atmospheric player: La Ni\u00f1a<\/a>.\n <\/p>\n \n La Ni\u00f1a has about coin-flip odds of emerging this fall, with a 53% chance from September through November, according to the latest National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasts<\/a>. It has a slightly better chance \u2013 58% \u2013 of emerging by the end of the year. The odds are good enough to have triggered a La Ni\u00f1a watch from NOAA.\n <\/p>\n \n Once it arrives, it\u2019s likely to stick around for much of the winter and make its mark on the country\u2019s temperature and precipitation patterns before it diminishes in early spring.\n <\/p>\n \n As a refresher: La Ni\u00f1a is a natural climate pattern marked by cooler than average water temperatures in the equatorial Pacific that also leads to changes in upper atmosphere patterns \u2014 together, these influence weather globally.\n <\/p>\n \n Forecasters closely monitor La Ni\u00f1a and its counterpart El Ni\u00f1o because they influence weather in a way that\u2019s largely consistent and predictable well in advance, especially when the patterns are strong. They exert the most influence during winter in the Northern Hemisphere, but that sway fades during other seasons, allowing other atmospheric influences to seep in.\n <\/p>\n \n The upcoming La Nina looks to be on the weaker end of the spectrum, which could also affect how clear-cut its influence becomes. Here\u2019s what that means for weather in the months ahead.\n <\/p>\n \n La Ni\u00f1a conditions should build gradually throughout the fall and NOAA could declare La Ni\u00f1a\u2019s official arrival either at the tail-end of the season or around the start of winter.\n <\/p>\n \n This La Ni\u00f1a should show up on time for winter and hang out for much of the season, unlike last winter, when La Ni\u00f1a conditions were really late to the party<\/a> and didn\u2019t stick around for cake.\n <\/p>\n \n Knowing La Ni\u00f1a is coming provides a forecasting blueprint for what winter could look like in terms of temperature and precipitation trends, but La Ni\u00f1a doesn\u2019t always stick to the plan \u2014 especially when it\u2019s expected to be weak, meaning other phenomena could join the mix.\n <\/p>\n \n La Ni\u00f1a\u2019s biggest influence is always on the jet stream \u2013 a river of air that storms flow through. The jet stream often shifts north during a La Ni\u00f1a winter, which pulls stormy weather out of the South and into more of the northern US.\n <\/p>\n \n The Climate Prediction Center\u2019s forecast<\/a> for meteorological winter \u2013 December through February \u2013 definitely has La Ni\u00f1a\u2019s fingerprints: A drier than normal winter is likely in many of the southernmost states with a couple pockets of the northern US expecting more precipitation than normal.\n <\/p>\n \n Snow lovers can\u2019t celebrate just yet \u2014 more precipitation than normal doesn\u2019t guarantee it will come as snow. Temperatures still have to be chilly enough both above and at the surface for snow to fall and stick, and that might not be the case this year.\n <\/p>\n \n La Ni\u00f1a winters typically favor warmer than normal conditions in the South with cooler conditions for some northwest and north-central states.\n <\/p>\n \n True to form, the South is expected to be warmer than normal this winter, but so too are the Southwest, parts of the Rockies and nearly the entire Eastern Seaboard. That just shows that La Ni\u00f1a isn\u2019t the only factor in play for the CPC\u2019s forecasts.\n <\/p>\n \n Weak La Ni\u00f1a events tend to allow for more snow<\/a> in the Northeast, but that above-average temperature forecast could impede dreams of a winter wonderland. A small slice of the Pacific Northwest is the only portion of the Lower 48 expected to be cooler than normal this winter. For the rest of the country, it\u2019s a toss-up whether winter will end up warmer, cooler or close to normal.\n <\/p>\n \n Last winter wasn\u2019t a record-warm one, like what the US experienced in 2023<\/a>, but it was still much warmer than normal. It ended up warmer than 80% of all winter seasons since the late 1800s.\n <\/p>\n \n The idea of a typical winter is distorting as the world warms due to fossil fuel pollution: Winter has become the fastest-warming season<\/a> for nearly 75% of the US. Snowfall is also declining<\/a> around the globe as the climate changes.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Facebook Tweet Email Link As a taste of fall gives much of the United States a break from…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":179369,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[1582,276,2961,224,5337],"class_list":{"0":"post-179368","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-california","10":"tag-la","11":"tag-los-angeles","12":"tag-losangeles"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115100037279082625","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=179368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/179368\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/179369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=179368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=179368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=179368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"La](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/digi-la-nina-conus-enso-explainer-082625.png\")
<\/p>\n![\"Winter](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cnnd-cpc-outlook-precip-seasonal-dec-feb-082625-20250826150249251.png\")
<\/p>\n![\"Winter](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/cnnd-cpc-outlook-temp-seasonal-dec-feb-real-082625.png\")
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