(State) Mild conditions to start December are likely to even out at some point over the winter.
State Climatologist Justin Glisan points to the law of averages and anticipates a temperature drop eventually. “We are going to pay for it at some point.” Glisan says, “The jet stream is further north and that allows warmer temperatures to intrude into the Midwest and you’ve seen 50’s, 60’s, and some 70’s.”
The next 7-14 days continue to show high probability of warmer than normal temperatures before falling back to reality. Glisan gave a presentation this past week in Ames in regards to snowfall potential for winter time. “We are currently in a weak La Nina phase. If we look at years in which we’ve been in weak La Nina during winter time we actually have a slightly elevated chance of above average snow pack. If we look at last year, we had ten inches over the winter time average in snowfall and we were in a weak La Nina last year.”
In November the average temp for Southwest Iowa was 42 degrees or four degrees above normal. Precip was 1.18″ or .8″ less than expected. Atlantic had an average high three degrees above normal at 53 degrees. Precipitation was .55″ below normal at 1.10″. All of it fell in a 24 hour period between the 10th and 11th. The highest temperature was 70 degrees on the 16th. The coolest temp was 12 degrees on the 26th.
