No end in sight to dry weather

I just pulled up the GFS forecast again and the end to the dry weather that I mentioned was possible a couple days ago has now disappeared completely from the long range. Of course long range forecasts are the least certain.

Surely though, this is unusual for a forecast reaching to Oct 14:

Notice the temperatures steadily declining. We should see frost soon if the clear nights continue.

October is normally our 4th driest month of the year (November is #1).

We usually get 65mm of rain in September and 42mm in August. We usually get 194mm of rain in October.

Since August 1st we have only measured 8.4mm of rain at Alberniweather. We might get a few sprinkles on Friday but certainly nothing that will approach the 100mm of rain we should have gotten in the past two months. If we are still in this position on October 14, as the forecast currently says, then it will be hard to call this anything other than a drought.

Agriculture Canada provides some numbers to determine ‘drought’ conditions for farmers in Canada.

You can check out their website here:

Here is the latest 60 day rolling data:

As you can see the grey area in our area amounts to more than 100mm below average precipitation.

The El Niño based forecasts and other long range stuff has been released from EC and Accuweather. All point to a weak El Niño. This would not provide the big precipitation nor the big warmth we often get with a strong El Niño and the monthly forecasts are running with that.

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Alberniweather Blog (Chris)

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