Matt Lanza

Some miscellany to start the week on the upcoming hurricane season, observations, and NOAA

Hurricane outlook season continues

We focus a lot on Colorado State’s hurricane outlook, but many others are beginning to issue their own as well. This includes The Weather Company and Atmospheric G2, which expect a slightly more active season.

Various named storm outlooks for the 2025 hurricane season showing a generally average to above average season expected. (Seasonal Hurricane Predictions)

A number of outlooks are now public, and there seems to be a consensus that most entities buy into an active season but perhaps not a hyperactive one. Recall, last year’s hurricane forecasts were pretty unanimously doomsday, which is kind of what happened (though not in the way we all expected). This year’s are not. But the message should be that it only takes one storm, and you should prepare this season as you would any other one if you live in hurricane country.

Tropical weather outlooks from the NHC will resume in about 3 weeks.

One last note: A recent paper published in Nature Climate Change focused on storm surge extremes, and it turns out that we may be underestimating them at a majority of coastal sites due to observational gaps. As it turns out, more data is good. Which leads us to…

Putting the “fun” back in NOAA funding

In summary: There has been some good news recently, but the negatives continue to outweigh the positives.

Obviously, we are watching the developments surrounding NOAA and the National Weather Service and budget issues very closely. Here’s an update on where we stand and some apolitical thoughts on what’s going on.

One of the major issues we’ve discussed recently has been regarding staffing cuts leading to fewer weather balloon launches each day. That continues to be a problem. There has been some minor progress, however. Representative Mike Flood, a Nebraska Republican congressman has been one of a handful of political leaders that has been fairly vocal on the risks of this. In short, he gets it. The good news is that balloon launches are scheduled to return to Omaha, and improvements in launch frequency are slated for some other High Plains and Northern Plains locations. The bad news is that staffing is coming from other offices. In other words, the risk is that we may be creating more problems by solving one problem.

Sites that launched weather balloons on Sunday morning. Better, but not perfect. (NOAA)

A good example of this is happening here in Houston where the local forecast office will soon be without a meteorologist in charge, a warning coordination meteorologist, and a science and operations officer, the top 3 leadership positions in the office. While those will be filled with reassigned employees, it’s pretty evident that hiring freezes, and “strongly encouraged” early retirements are creating a math problem that will only be solved by re-hiring fired probationary employees (which the current administration is against) or bringing in new hires (which the current administration has shown no appetite for to this point). 2 + 2 + 2 is still 6 no matter if the person is in Omaha, Houston, or Fairbanks. The government allowed or “strongly encouraged” hundreds of years of cumulative forecasting experience and mentorship walk out the door in the last 2 to 3 months. So, while there are some positive signs popping up, more must be done. We are objectively worse off in terms of the National Weather Service than we were four months ago and we’re not trending better enough fast enough. Without being overly activist, I’ll just say that these are issues you should raise with your members of Congress if they concern you.

A lot of what is happening is targeting climate change research, but what a lot of the folks enacting these cuts don’t fully understand is that by targeting that, they’re likely to cause significant collateral damage to weather forecasting in the process. One good example of this was the recent failure to renew a bunch of regional climate center funding earlier this month, which caused several data sources used by meteorologists (including myself) on a regular basis to go offline. Thankfully, that funding was renewed, but the passback document unearthed recently suggests it will not be long until that’s back on the chopping block. I am also especially concerned that cuts to the GFDL, AOML, and NSSL labs, collateral damage in this fight, would cause outsized harm to weather research and forecasting. This point continues to need to be reiterated and raised. This isn’t about your stance on climate change, it’s about fundamentally degrading the capability of the NWS to achieve its mission of protecting life and property.

For a unique and helpful perspective on some of the bureaucracy here, I encourage you to follow Alan Gerard’s Substack, “Balanced Weather.” Alan is a recently retired veteran of NOAA and is very measured in his explanations. He is also anti-hype and focuses on the issues of note. A worthy newsletter to tap into.

Another thing to really understand in this whole thing: How much is a weather forecast actually worth? Planet Money recently re-aired a really good feature about the value of weather forecasts. Since 2009, when thinking of just hurricane forecast improvements alone, it’s estimated that roughly $7 billion has been saved thanks to government-driven research. And again, that’s just on hurricanes. It’s a short segment that’s worth 10 minutes of your time.

One of the most common questions I’ve heard because of the cuts is “Are you seeing impacts?” I believe we are seeing some of the issues of the reduced weather balloon launches rear their heads in real time. I have begun to notice that some higher-resolution short term models are struggling a bit more than usual in capturing significant thunderstorm complexes. Of more interest is seeing global models, like the European model do a great job depicting a threat 3 to 6 days ahead of time but then misplacing it within 3 days. Why is this happening? Theoretically, it would fit the idea that a lack of upper air data in a region would contribute to this. Is it officially the reason? No. We have to be careful, as it’s not unheard of for this to happen in spring. But it merits continued monitoring ahead of hurricane season. The takeaway right now is that missing upper air data is probably having some impact on our forecasts but mostly in a “cosmetic” fashion or “slightly higher uncertainty than usual” so far. Time will tell.

Spring heavy rain and flooding on the way to the Plains and parts of the Mid-South

The irony of writing about flooding from 34,000 feet above the Sonoran Desert doesn’t escape me at the moment, but here we are. I wanted to provide a Tuesday late day update on what’s ahead in the Southern Plains and Mid-South. Yesterday, we noted some thoughts about Mississippi River flooding and tied it back to another round of heavy rain potentially this weekend. The good news is that the hardest hit areas, such as Kentucky, southern Indiana, and Tennessee should escape significant issues if the current forecast holds between now and Monday. But, we are likely to see new issues crop up across Missouri, Arkansas, southeast Kansas, Oklahoma, or even northern Texas. This is reflected in the current flood hazard outlook.

The experimental flood hazard outlook from NOAA shows widespread river flooding continuing after the rains of a couple weeks ago, as well as an upcoming area highlighted for days 4-7. (NOAA)

The area highlighted over the Plains and Mid-South is the area we’re keeping an eye on for the weekend and early next week.

The current NOAA rainfall forecast centered over Missouri shows good odds of 2 to 5 inches of rain over the next 7 days. Other than some variations in exact placement among the various models (which you’d expect to see), this is fairly stable confidence outlook.

Roughly 2 to 5 inches are expected over a wide area from Oklahoma through Illinois over the next week. (Pivotal Weather)

We’re starting to see some solid probabilities of 4 inches or more over the next week or so show up in this area now on the European ensemble’s 51 members. Almost half of them are in that territory now. So confidence in a fairly decent rain event are growing.

About 40 to 50 percent of European ensemble members are forecasting 4 inches of rain or more over southern Missouri through next week (PolarWx)

Exactly how much rain falls and how serious any flooding will be is yet to be determined. We’ll obviously have severe weather to consider too. Currently that looks like an issue Friday through Sunday, possibly into Monday to the east. Whatever the case, we’ll continue to monitor this. Flooding is a point of interest for me personally, so events like this catch my eye.

The pendulum swings back to high water on the Mississippi River

Headlines

  • The southern half of Mississippi River will experience moderate to major flooding in the days ahead, albeit well under levels seen in other flood events in recent years.
  • But the addition of potentially significant rainfall in portions of the Mid-South this weekend (Oklahoma, Missouri, Arkansas) could add to Lower Mississippi flooding risks.

Flood situation on the Mississippi

About a year and a half ago, dire concerns were raised about salt water intrusion into the water supply of the Mississippi River because water levels had gotten so low. Thankfully that threat passed, and for the most part, things have been rather ho-hum in the Mississippi. We’re beginning to see signs of change now, however, as all the water from the multi-day rainstorm earlier this month dumps into the Mississippi River.

River gauges along the Mississippi and nearby tributaries that are expected to be in moderate or major flood stage over the upcoming days. (NOAA National Water Prediction Service)

None of the rises on the Mississippi look to be anything outlandish. For example, at Hickman, Kentucky, just downstream of where the Ohio empties into the Mississippi, there is major flooding expected, but still about 9 feet shy of the record from 2011.

The Mississippi at Hickman, KY will remain stable in major flood through the weekend. (NOAA)

Farther downstream at Osceola, Arkansas (just north of Memphis), the river is slated to be at a level of about 37.5 feet, which multiple floods have topped in the last 15 years.

The Mississippi at Osceola, AR will stay stable in major flood but well shy of levels seen in 2011, 2016, 2018, and 2019. (NOAA)

The story repeats down past Memphis into Mississippi, where the river will rise to moderate or major levels but nothing too absurd.

Down in Baton Rouge, the river will continue rising this week, eventually projected to crest around next Wednesday at levels similar to what had been seen in May of 2017 (and lower than levels reached in 2011, 2016, 2018, 2019, and 2020).

The Mississippi in Baton Rouge will crest sometime next week just over the mark into major flooding but lower than levels seen in 2018-2020. (NOAA)

Back to the rains in the Mid-South

One interesting element about the river forecasts is that they only contain rainfall forecasts in the next 24 to 36 hours or so. So, we assume 0 rain falls after, say this Wednesday. Which brings me to an interesting possible storyline that could develop in the Mississippi. Over the upcoming holiday weekend, a cold front is going to push into the Ohio Valley and Mid-South again. There will likely be some degree of severe weather with this, though exactly how widespread or significant remains to be seen.

Forecast surface weather map for Saturday morning, showing a cold front pushing into the Mid-South and some disturbances gathering across the Southwest. (NOAA WPC)

One thing I did notice this morning while going over my forecasting is that the ridge of high pressure setting up over the Southeast is expected to flex again this weekend. In fact, on Saturday morning, the European ensemble has about an 80 percent probability of the upper-level high pressure being in 99.5th percentile for this time of year. In simple language: It will be strong. Similar (but far less alarming at this point) than what we saw a couple weeks ago.

The probability is high that the ridge of high pressure over the Southeast will be quite strong this weekend, likely slowing or stalling the Mid-South cold front. (Polarwx.com)

So the combination of a cold front slowing or stalling as it runs into a southeast ridge would likely lead to an increasing risk of heavy rainfall. Unlike last time, where the bullseye was extremely widespread but focused on Kentucky, at least the initial odds this time favor Missouri and Arkansas. About 40 to 50 percent of the 51 European ensemble members show 3 inches or more of rainfall over northwest Arkansas through early next week, with 20 to 30 percent showing 4 inches or more.

Another round of possibly significant rain shows increasing odds this weekend from southern Missouri through Oklahoma. (Polarwx.com)

What does this all mean? For one, it means that the upcoming weather story will perhaps focus once more on the Mid-South or southern Plains. Secondly, it could mean that the forecasts for the Mississippi River, particularly those down into Louisiana have some risk of increasing in the days ahead. Or, perhaps the river will just stay high for longer, an entirely feasible outcome. Whatever the case, after a quiet week last week, the weather is beginning to look interesting again.

Let’s talk about the Western U.S. and their water situation in 2025

As a meteorologist, weather in general fascinates me. I worked two years in California about 15 years ago, and when I took that job, everyone teased me, saying the weather was “so easy” to forecast. And, yes, about 80 percent of the year, conditions are pretty stable overall. There is nuance to that. Most people may not realize a minor difference in temperature from day to day, but it’s something that can be reflected in power usage. Same goes for wind or solar output in terms of forecast weather for wind farms or solar facilities. But what always kind of fascinated me about the West was water.

So far, 2025 has been a mixed year in the Western U.S. On the one hand, California snowpack is doing great.

Sierra snowpack is running about 120 percent of normal in the north and 85 percent of normal in the south. (California DWR)

It’s been a late season bonanza up north, with snowpack levels sitting at 120 percent of average north of Lake Tahoe. The central Sierra are a little less well-off but still close to normal. The southern Sierra have not had their best winter ever, but even still snow water equivalent is around 85 percent of normal. There have certainly been worse years in California.

It’s when you get into the interior West that the problems start. Take Colorado. Their peak snowpack is likely to be the lowest since 2018. The northern part of the state has done well with near average snowfall this year.

Colorado’s snowpack as of April 8th as a percent of the 30 year median. (USDA)

The Colorado River headwaters are also running near average, but southern Colorado, particularly the San Juan and Upper Rio Grande basins are in bad shape. Snow water equivalents are running about 60 percent of the median right now, or well, well below average.

The story improves some in Utah, where the basins are a little noisier, but in general not in bad shape outside of southern Utah. Similar story in Wyoming and Idaho. Not great, not terrible. Oregon? Fantastic winter. Washington? Less so. But for Arizona and New Mexico, it was a dreadful winter.

Snow-water equivalents compared to the median are running way above normal in Oregon and way below normal in Arizona and New Mexico. (USDA)

Flagstaff, Arizona has seen 51 inches of snow this winter, compared to a normal of 86 inches typically. In Albuquerque, they’ve had 1.68 inches of rain since October 1st, compared to 3.38 inches on average. It’s turning out to be pretty bad. Snowpack is particularly important because as the seasons change, that snow melts and it feeds the rivers of the West and subsequently the reservoirs, farms, and hydroelectric power that is scattered about. The relationship is not 1-to-1, where 100 percent of snowpack means streamflow of 100 percent. Even though the upper Colorado Basin saw decent snow, with nearly 100 percent of normal, the forecast streamflow from CLIMAS is only 84 percent of normal.

New Mexico reservoirs are in very poor condition. (CLIMAS via Laura Paskus)

For the Rio Grande it’s even worse, with the CLIMAS streamflow forecast being only 52 percent of normal! Laura Paskus, who writes an excellent blog focused on New Mexico recently shared the image above from the CLIMAS March report showing reservoir levels in New Mexico. They are not good. At all.

Suffice to say, there have been glimmers of hope in recent years from some strong winters — but the underlying problems are not going anywhere in the West. There is still a shortage of water, and there is high risk that this will only get worse in future years. Absolutely reckless and illogical decisions like releasing water in California earlier this year may not seem like a huge deal on the surface, but every single drop is precious in the West. As it is, the situation regarding water is already tense. The states that utilize the Colorado River are up against a clock to come to an agreement on a joint management proposal by May. A quasi-handshake agreement that had been in place with Mexico for a shift in water delivery to Tijuana from the Colorado was rejected for the first time in 80 years this year because of complaints that Mexico is not supplying enough treaty-mandated water to Texas from the Rio Grande.

All this underscores the very, very tenuous situation in the West. I hope to include some additional coverage or words on this topic in the future here because this problem is not going to go away anytime soon, and if anything, it’s going to continue to worsen. Water doesn’t recognize borders of states or countries, which makes it an especially challenging and precious commodity to wrangle.