Weather Outlook for 2019
\nPam Knox, Director of the UGA Weather Network
\nSummary:
\n\u2022 After a cool start to April, most of the month is expected to be warmer than normal.
\n\u2022 Temperatures for the rest of spring, summer and fall are all leaning towards warmer
\nthan normal conditions due to long-term trends in temperature.
\n\u2022 No more frost is expected in Georgia this spring except for a few isolated areas in the NE
\nmountains.
\n\u2022 No strong signals are seen in precipitation for the spring, summer and fall, with
\nstatistically equal chances of above, near and below normal precipitation predicted.
\n\u2022 El Ni\u00f1o is near peak and is expected to last through most of the growing season, and it
\ncould continue into next winter. Summers after an El Ni\u00f1o ends are sometimes dry but
\nsince forecasts show the El Ni\u00f1o continuing, a drought does not seem as likely as after
\nother El Ni\u00f1o winters.<\/p>\n
\u2022 The Atlantic tropical season is likely to be less active than usual, which could bring dry
\nconditions later in summer and into fall. But storm paths are not predictable more than
\na few days ahead, so be prepared just in case.
\nFor more details read below.<\/p>\n
Temperature:
\nAs you know, the winter had some cold spells but was warmer than average for December
\nthrough February as a whole. In March, the northern counties have been cooler than normal
\nbut the rest of the state has been slightly warmer than normal. The next two weeks look like
\nthey are likely to be cooler than average for all of Georgia, but going into April the pattern
\nshould shift back to warmer than normal temperatures across the state. Looking farther ahead,
\nspring (March through May), summer (June through August), and fall (September through
\nNovember) are all showing increased chances of warmer than normal temperatures. In large
\npart this is due to the long-term trends to warmer temperatures seen across the region since
\nthe 1960s, especially in summer. It is interesting to note that most of the increase in average
\ntemperatures comes from warmer nights rather than warmer days, which reflects a
\ncombination of more pavement and higher humidity, both of which keep night-time
\ntemperatures high. You can check trends for individual months or other time periods at
\nhttps:\/\/www.ncdc.noaa.gov\/cag\/statewide\/time-series\/.<\/p>\n
Frost:
\nWe are near the end of the spring frost season. Looking at the long-range weather models
\nindicates that there is still a chance of frost in northern counties in Georgia into mid-April,
\nwhich is as far as those models can look. As it stands now, the southern 2\/3 of Georgia looks
\nfrost-free for the rest of the spring.
\nPrecipitation:
\nMarch was drier than normal for most of the state, which has led to the expansion of dry
\nconditions (see Drought below). The pattern for the first week of April also looks relatively dry,
\nwith wetter conditions returning after that. Wetter than normal conditions look slightly more
\nlikely than not for the rest of spring. After that, NOAA\u2019s Climate Prediction Center puts us in
\nequal chances of above, near and below normal rainfall through fall. Summer rainfall in Georgia
\nis hard to predict because most of it is tied to small-scale weather like local thunderstorms or
\ntropical systems which don\u2019t show up well in climate models, so this is not a big surprise. It also
\ndepends on how El Ni\u00f1o evolves (see below).<\/p>\n
El Ni\u00f1o:
\nWe are currently in a weak to moderate El Ni\u00f1o pattern. This means that the subtropical jet has
\nbeen parked across parts of the Southeast, bringing frequent rain and cloudy conditions to
\nareas along the path of the jet, as it has for most of the winter. This year the rain has been
\nconcentrated in northern GA, while southern Georgia, especially along the East Coast, has been
\nmissed by a lot of the rainfall. The forecast for El Ni\u00f1o is for it to continue near peak strength
\nfor the next few months before gradually weakening in summer. The latest forecasts indicate
\nthat it may come back again in fall, an unusual double-peak since most of the time it is a oneyear event. But predicting what El Ni\u00f1o will do in spring is tough, so don\u2019t be surprised if the
\nforecast changes in summer once we get past the spring predictability barrier. You can read
\nmore about the El Ni\u00f1o this year at https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/climate\/2019\/03\/el-nino-isvery-healthy-right-now\/.
\nDrought
\nAt the beginning of April, abnormally dry conditions were present in the southern half of
\nGeorgia with an area of moderate drought in east central Georgia, a consequence of being
\nmissed by a lot of the winter and early spring rains that we have experienced in northern
\nGeorgia. While I don\u2019t have big concerns about drought this year due to the continuation of El
\nNi\u00f1o, it is something to watch for in any summer after an El Ni\u00f1o winter. Warmer than normal
\ntemperatures will increase water demands for all crops this growing season. Some of you have
\nasked about comparisons with 2016, which also started out very wet but got rapidly drier over
\nthe course of the growing season. I don\u2019t think this year is going to be similar because in 2016
\nthe onset of the drought was linked to a rapid decline of that El Ni\u00f1o to neutral and then La
\nNi\u00f1a conditions in just a few months that is not expected to occur this year.<\/p>\n
Tropical Season:
\nGeorgia has been hard-hit by tropical storms the last two years, with Irma in 2017 and Michael
\nin 2018 doing tremendous damage to different parts of the state. In El Ni\u00f1o years, the number
\nof tropical systems that develop into storms is lower than normal because strong winds aloft
\ntend to disrupt the organization of storm circulations, effectively \u201cblowing the top off\u201d of any
\nstorms that might be trying to form. However, even in El Ni\u00f1o years, it is possible to get strong
\nhurricanes (think Hurricane Andrew in 1992). A less active season could mean drier conditions
\nfor Georgia later in summer and into fall, but if a storm does move over the area, it could do
\ntremendous damage. We can\u2019t predict where those storms will go more than a few days out, so
\nyou should be prepared to take care of your farms well in advance of the tropical season just in
\ncase.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Weather Outlook for 2019 Pam Knox, Director of the UGA Weather Network Summary: \u2022 After a cool start to April, most of the month is expected to be warmer than normal. \u2022 Temperatures for the rest of spring, summer and fall are all leaning towards warmer than normal conditions due to long-term trends in temperature. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":234,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-312","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/234"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":313,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312\/revisions\/313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/benhillcoag\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}