No rain likely in coming weeks

Aren’t April showers supposed to bring May flowers?

Not around here. At least not these days.

The regional weather forecast calls for warm and dry with potential for fire and high winds for at least the rest of this month and likely into next.

“It looks dry again. I sound like a broken record,” said Annette Mokry, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.

Jacob Riley, a meteorologist in Lubbock, said drought conditions in the region are even worsening. Most of the area failed to record any measurable rainfall amounts in March and hasn’t seen any significant moisture since snow covered the ground on Feb. 10. The Agricultural Science Center north of Clovis has reported about 10 inches of moisture over the past 15 months.

“Since we are so dry at the surface, and look to remain that way, it’ll be hard to see much moisture return to the region,” Riley said late last week.

But Riley offers some hope for later this summer.

“Our overall weather pattern is changing,” he said.

“Believe it or not, a big driving factor of our local weather pattern is partially determined by the water temperatures in the eastern Pacific.”

Riley said we are in what is called a La Niña phase of the ENSO (El Niño Southern Oscillation), and that this is the phase we have been in for the last three years.

“This phase results in below-average precipitation for most of our region. By May to June of this year, it looks like we will be in more of an El Niño phase, which is a good sign for returning moisture for eastern New Mexico and western Texas,” he said.

Parts of the region have enjoyed brief rainfall in recent days, but not enough to ward off fire danger. And forecasters said there is a small chance of precipitation on Monday night – about a 3% chance.

But the immediate future of rain is not promising.

“It doesn’t look like … any widespread precipitation,” Mokry said.