It’s been quite a while since Rocky View County (RVC) has seen any precipitation, and according to Environment Canada Meteorologist Dan Kulak, it might be a while yet before any hits the ground.
“The prairies, for the month of January, were above normal just about everywhere,” he said. “Going back into December (2015), we had some cooler weather going across parts of Alberta, but generally as a whole, the Prairies were above normal.
“The monthly forecast that we issued (Feb. 11) for the fifteenth of February through to the fourteenth of March shows a bunch of orange and red across southern Alberta. That corresponds to a 50 per cent or greater (depending on the colours) chance of above normal temperatures.”
Kulak said the forecast shows what is predicted over the next 28 days and is based on climatology data collected from 1995 to 2014.
He said it’s hard to determine why southern Alberta is experiencing warmer weather for this time of year than we’re used to, but one possible cause is a weather phenomenon known as El Nińo.
“El Nińo is part of the global circulation pattern. We think of weather as we look out the window and there’s a storm system moving through Alberta or something hitting B.C., or something like that, but El Nińo at a fundamental level is a warming of the waters of the tropical Pacific Ocean,” Kulak said.
“Typically, it’s a temperature distribution where the waters out towards the Philippines are warmer than the waters on the coast of South America and every few years things flip around for a bunch of complicated reasons and you end up with a bunch of warm water pooling off the cost of South America. This extra warm water causes changes in the air flows, the wind patterns across much of the hemisphere and we end up with cooler air masses being pushed further to the north, producing dryer weather across the Prairies.
“The outlook for the spring with the El Nińo that we have is that it’s starting to weaken. The latest data that we have is from January. El Nińos typically do peak around the Christmas period. This particular one was noteworthy for how early it was and how strong it was in the early phases. We’re starting to slide back down into what we call a neutral position in the oceans.”
The dryer, warm weather is not without its downsides, however. The Province of Alberta has already begun planning for wild fire season.
“We have such a moisture deficit. Precipitation has been so dry across the prairies. Overall it’s been so dry,” Kulak said.
“We need to be concerned about forest fires, the surface waters for agriculture, river levels for everybody.”
Agriculture and Forestry at the Province of Alberta announced Feb. 16 permits for planned fires would be required starting March 1, a full month earlier than normal.
“By beginning one month early, we can more effectively monitor burning activities and also ensure that our firefighters are well prepared to respond quickly when wildfires are detected,” said Oneil Carlier, Minister of Agriculture and Forestry.
In 2015, a total of 1,786 wildfires that burned more than 492,000 hectares broke out in Alberta, more than twice the 25-year average.
For more information about Alberta’s weather and weather forecasts go to weather.gc.ca
