LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Winter in Arkansas will once again be impacted by La Niña.
The 90-day temperature and precipitation outlook for the climate prediction center indicates below average temperatures and precipitation from December through February. This lines up with a return of La Niña for the winter of 2024-2025.
La Niña occurs when the waters of the eastern pacific are colder than normal. This can cause fluctuations in the jet stream pattern over the northern hemisphere during the winter months.
The jet stream is expected to ride just to the north of our area, drier conditions may persist throughout winter. Plus, the polar jet is expected to stay north keeping most of the cold air bottled up over southern Canada and the northern United States.
Occasionally a blast or two of cold air may make it this far south, but generally speaking, La Niña winters are milder than average.
Looking back, three out of the last four winters have been classified as moderate La Niñas. The first, in 2021, provided a whopping 20.3 inches of snow in Little Rock. The next year, only 6 inches of snow fell in the capital city, and the third and final moderate La Niña only produced one-tenth of an inch of snow.
So, even though all three La Niñas were of moderate classification, they provided differing amounts of snow.
The winter of 2023-2024 was not a La Niña, but a strong El Niño which produced 3.75 inches of snow for the winter.
The average snowfall in Little Rock during any given year is 3.8 inches.
So, what about the chance of snow this winter? The THV11 winter impact team will have a winter outlook on November 25, 2024, at 10:00 p.m.
If you miss the showing of the winter outlook, you can stream it on the THV11+ app that is available for free download on Amazon Firestick, Roku, and Apple TV.