El Nino and Tomorrow's Forecast

To begin today's forecast and outlook, I will begin with another update regarding the long range forecast. The El Nino has severely weakened over the past few days and weeks. Now, while I do refer to this event as an El Nino, it is not officially an El Nino. To be considered a true ENSO event, the Sea surface temperatures relative to normal (on either side of the spectrum) across the Equatorial Pacific need to be at least 0.5 for an El Nino and -0.5 for La Nina. This condition needs to be true for at least three months. In this year's case, neither has happened. SST anomalies have not been consistently above 0.5 degrees Celsius, and they have not persisted for three months. In fact, in the latest analysis of the El Nino, most of the remaining warmer waters have faded and shifted westward, causing an extreme weakening of the El Nino. This could be really good news for anybody who loves a good winter in our area. Using climateology, "neutral" winters  usually give us the best chance for heavy snowfall events across the area. Hopefully, this is true, as last year was too warm to support any "real" snowstorms.
    
For tomorrow's forecast, I expect clouds to build into the region ahead of a shortwave. I expect a few showers and even a thunderstorm in the afternoon hours. Yet another small "storm system" will move south out of Canada, sideswipe the area with some rain on Wednesday. A short period of cooler temperatures will come to the area after the passage of the cold front, with highs dropping into the middle 60's on Thursday. For most of the week, I expect temperatures to remain right near 70. By the beginning of next week, signs are pointing to cooler weather across the United States, and a stormier pattern looks to resume across the Northern Plains.