{"id":34456,"date":"2014-02-13T08:09:45","date_gmt":"2014-02-13T14:09:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/?p=34456"},"modified":"2014-02-13T17:26:23","modified_gmt":"2014-02-13T23:26:23","slug":"could-2014-be-a-drought-buster-for-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2014\/02\/13\/could-2014-be-a-drought-buster-for-texas\/","title":{"rendered":"Could 2014 Be a Drought-Buster for Texas?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_2762\"  class=\"wp-caption module image right\" style=\"max-width: 300px;\"><a class=\"fancybox\" title=\"An empty rain gauge is strapped to a fence post on the edge of a pasture this summer near Canadian, Texas\" href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/120001041.jpg\" rel=\"\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-2762\" alt=\"An empty rain gauge is strapped to a fence post on the edge of a pasture this summer near Canadian, Texas\" src=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/120001041-300x200.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/120001041-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/120001041-220x146.jpg 220w, https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/files\/2011\/12\/120001041.jpg 594w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Photo by Scott Olson\/Getty Images<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">An empty rain gauge is strapped to a fence post on the edge of a pasture this summer near Canadian, Texas<\/p><\/div>\n<p>In Spanish, El Ni\u00f1o means \u201cthe boy child.\u201d But if <a href=\"http:\/\/www.elnino.noaa.gov\/\">El Ni\u00f1o <\/a>predictions for late 2014 prove correct, winter rainfall in Texas could be anything but little.\u00a0 The deceptively-named weather pattern generally brings rain to Texas. Lots of it.<\/p>\n<p>El Ni\u00f1o occurs when warm water buried below the surface of the Pacific rises up and spreads along the equator towards America. It often causes storms that devastate parts of Latin America, Indonesia and Australia, but it could also bring relief to drought-stricken Texas.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt tends to cause the jetstream to be farther south than normal, which means we may get more rain events, generally cool temperatures and lots of run-off, which would be good for reservoir levels,\u201d John Nielsen-Gammen, Texas State Climatologist, tells StateImpact Texas.<\/p>\n<p>Now, a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.pnas.org\/content\/early\/2014\/02\/07\/1323058111.abstract\">new study<\/a> from Stanford University gives the El Ni\u00f1o weather pattern a 76 percent chance of returning this year. What exactly does that mean?<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/w.soundcloud.com\/player\/?url=https%3A\/\/api.soundcloud.com\/tracks\/134684063&amp;color=ff5500&amp;auto_play=false&amp;hide_related=false&amp;show_artwork=true\"><\/iframe>If El Ni\u00f1o does form, Texas might see some wetter weather even before the winter months, Nielsen-Gammen says.<\/p>\n<p>It could also mean a possibly weaker hurricane season for the Gulf of Mexico.<\/p>\n<h4>Too Early to Know for Sure<\/h4>\n<p>Climatologists are generally limited to predicting El Ni\u00f1o 6 months prior to its formation, due to what is called the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/weather\/2014\/02\/10\/el-nino-prediction\/5368631\/\">&#8220;spring barrier.&#8221;<\/a> But Stanford researchers believe they developed a model that allows projection of an El Ni\u00f1o event a whole year ahead.<\/p>\n<p>Nielsen-Gammon says more time must pass in order to make a definite forecast.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve been telling people that signs are pointing towards the possibility of an El Ni\u00f1o, but it\u2019s still too early to call,\u201d Nielsen-Gammon says.<\/p>\n<p>Texans have been disappointed by a no-show in the recent past. In 2012 forecasters said there was a good chance El Ni\u00f1o could bring relief from the drought, but <a href=\"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/2012\/11\/01\/el-nino-changed-his-mind-cooler-wetter-winter-no-longer-forecast\/\">the weather pattern never formed.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Spanish, El Ni\u00f1o means \u201cthe boy child.\u201d But if El Ni\u00f1o predictions for late 2014 prove correct, winter rainfall in Texas could be anything but little.\u00a0 The deceptively-named weather pattern generally brings rain to Texas. Lots of it. El Ni\u00f1o occurs when warm water buried below the surface of the Pacific rises up and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":170,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[58],"tags":[61,140],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34456"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/170"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34456"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34496,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34456\/revisions\/34496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/texas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}