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[h=4]El Niño unlikely to quench California desert's thirst[/h]Even the largest El Niño couldn't erase California's epic drought.
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A massive El Niño that can be seen on Japan's Himawari-8 Weather Satellite could mean the beginning of the end to California's historic drought. VPC
Raindrops cling to a windshield after after a brief shower in Rancho MIrage, Thursday, July 11, 2013.(Photo: Michael Snyder/The Desert Sun)
PALM SPRINGS, Calif. — If the next big El Niño is anything like the last big El Niño, the Palm Springs area can expect a long, wet, cold — and welcome — winter.
However, even the largest El Niño couldn't erase California's epic drought, so don't go turning your lawn sprinklers back on quite yet.
Meteorologists are watching a potentially historic El Niño event brewing in the Pacific, with the potential to rival the 1997-1998 event that brought heavy rainfall to California.
Locally, that was a winter of weird weather. It brought a 70% boost in rainfall between December and February, and unusually cold temperatures that started early in October and lasted through late May. The Coachella Valley was also narrowly missed by a tropical storm in September, snow flurries fell in March and a freak snowstorm blanketed the Mount San Jacinto in white in mid-May.
USA TODAY
Massive El Niño growing, say models
But just because that happened then, doesn't mean it will happen again, said Tina Stall, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
The true strength of the looming El Niño won't be confirmed until the fall, and even if it is large enough to bring heavy rain to Southern California, that doesn't guarantee the rains will reach the Coachella Valley, Stall said. Just like everyday storms, El Niño storms could get stuck on the San Jacinto Mountains, dropping rain on the peaks but leaving the valley floor dry.
"You will probably have more chance of rain, if that strong El Niño pans out, but it will still vary system to system," Stall said.
Although the implications for the Coachella Valley are unclear, the broader impact on Southern California is more in focus.
Daniel Swain, a Stanford University doctoral student who runs the California Weather Blog, said that not every El Niño event brings rain to California, but stronger events — like the one predicted for this winter — almost always do. Even better, the rainfall is generally focused on Southern California, the state's drier, drought-stricken half, Swain said.
The cracked dry surface of Percolation Pond 5 awaits water at Windy Point, Friday July 10, 2015. The percolation ponds are used to refill the aquifer beneath the Coachella Valley with Colorado River Water during wetter times.<span style="color: Red;">*</span>(Photo: Jay Calderon/The Desert Sun)
"What is pretty likely, if we do get a strong event, is a lot of Southern California will probably see a wet winter," Swain said. "Not necessarily an epically wet winter, but a winter that will seem especially wet because so many dry years have preceded it."
As big as this El Niño might be, the drought is bigger. California's average rainfall would need to double or triple to erase the rainfall deficit that was created over four years of drought. And, if it actually did rain that much, large amounts of rainwater would be lost to flooding, making it meaningless to California's overall thirst for water.
The impact also hinges on temperature, because El Niño rains can't recharge the Sierra Nevada snow pack if it is not cold enough to form snow, Swain said.
Ultimately, the best case for the California drought is that El Niño brings a cold winter of steady, yet not stormy, rainfall.
"There is a lot of evidence that is not what will happen," Swain said. "For better or for worse, our characteristic climate is feast or famine. The majority of days, most of California is dry. We get dry spells punctuated by big storms. ... The primary affect of a really big El Niño Event is to increase the number of those big storms, and juice them up with a lot of extra water."
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