El Niño conditions expected to develop late summer

TUCSON, Ariz. (KGUN) — El Niño is a weather phenomenon that creates warmer sea-surface temperatures typically every three to five years.

Weather experts are predicting the next El Niño to occur late this summer.

“This is warmer ocean temperatures, that's forecast to develop over the summer months,” said Ken Drozd, a Warning Coordination Meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Tucson.

El Niño is predicted to develop from May to July this year. The last El Niño happened from 2018-2019.

“Day to day, you're probably not going to notice that a whole lot, but we do have some relationships with the overall weather pattern that develops. It's a better relationship during the winter months,” said Drozd.

Drozd said typically, El Niño can bring above-average precipitation during the winter.

But as far as impacts on monsoon?

“Yeah, maybe a little bit too late arriving for the monsoons to really have much of an impact,” said Drozd.

With the possibility of affecting winter rain, economists say this could potentially help with Arizona’s water cuts from the Colorado River supply.

“One of our main macro risks in Arizona is obviously a lack of water. So, to the extent that El Niño is going to happen to help us snowpack and help avoid Colorado river cuts, that would be a direct longer term benefit to the economy,” said Derek Lemoine, an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Arizona.

Expected to occur by late summer or early fall, climate experts say this El Niño has the potential to set a new temperature record making global temperatures higher.