El Nino or El Nada? Heat, dry spell stoke drought worry

February 12, 2016 at 9:55 p.m. | Updated February 13, 2016 at 3:55 a.m.

by Associated Press

A cyclist rides along recently installed temporary flood control walls along the L.A. River in Los Angeles Friday, Feb. 12, 2016. The US Army Corps of Engineers installed about three miles of temporary barriers along the river through Griffith Park, Atwater Village, and Silver Lake, to increase the amount of water the river can hold during El Nino season. Where did El Nino go? Ten days with record heat and no rain have Californians worrying about the drought again. The dry spell came after a strong El Nino dropped near-normal rain and snow this winter, raising hopes that four years of record dry conditions might be over.
A cyclist rides along recently installed temporary flood control walls along the L.A. River in Los Angeles Friday, Feb. 12, 2016. The US Army Corps of Engineers installed about three miles of temporary barriers along the river through Griffith Park, Atwater Village, and Silver Lake, to increase the amount of water the river can hold during El Nino season. Where did El Nino go? Ten days with record heat and no rain have Californians worrying about the drought again. The dry spell came after a strong El Nino dropped near-normal rain and snow this winter, raising hopes that four years of record dry conditions might be over.

SONOMA, Calif.-Where did El Nino go?

Winter has suddenly switched off the rain and flipped on heat up to 95 degrees in California, raising jitters that the strong El Nino might not be the drought-buster the crispy state had hoped.

"Forget El Nino, this is El No-no!" YouTube celebrity Hannah Hart tweeted.

Heat records have fallen across the West in recent days, from Oregon to Phoenix to Los Angeles, where surfers hit the beaches and golfers strolled fairways.

Much of California marked its 10th straight day on Friday without measurable precipitation. The blue skies were increasingly unwelcome in a state that just logged its four driest years on record. California has been looking for a robust and rainy El Nino to bring it out of mandatory water cutbacks.

"It's nice to have the weather, but we hope to have the rain," Tia Gavin of Santa Rosa said as she showed out-of-town visitors around the adobe central plaza of the wine country town of Sonoma. Strollers in shorts surveyed restaurant windows and lolled on blankets on green grass under the sun.

The dry spell came after El Nino dropped near-normal rain and snow earlier this winter.

"If you just looked at the precipitation, you wouldn't think that there was an El Nino going on," said Sam Iacobellis, a climate researcher at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego. He has been taking note of early blooming flowers as he drove to work this week.

Strong El Ninos such as the one this year typically bring strong rain, Iacobellis said. However, there have been few modern El Ninos on the scale of this one, making comparisons trickier, he said.

National Weather Service forecasters were quick to offer soothing messages of drizzle yet to come. "No need to be concerned," forecaster Steve Anderson said. The balmy weather has "been awesome. It's been great. But it's not going to last," he said. "It's still winter."

Californians are particularly concerned about whether the warm stretch is melting the above-average snowpack in the Sierra Nevada. The snow generally provides about a third of the state's water when it thaws in the spring.

Upcoming Events