A La Nina might be coming this winter. What does that mean for the Lowcountry?

A weak El Nino is in part to blame for the intensity of the 2017 Atlantic hurricane season, but even though El Nino failed to have much of an impact on the area, the National Weather Service in Charleston increasingly believes its sister will show up in full force.

The weather service’s Climate Prediction Center predicts a 55 to 60 percent chance of a La Nina event occurring this winter. That is far from a sure thing, but if it happens we should feel it here.

A La Nina occurs when waters in the equatorial Pacific Ocean are colder than normal. Those colder waters have an effect on the west coast jet stream, which in turn effects the east coast jet stream, and the chain reaction started by cooler waters over 2,000 miles from the Lowcountry changes weather patterns around the country. Here it tends to make things warmer and drier.

That doesn’t necessarily mean you should pack up your umbrellas or keep your tank tops handy, though, according to Carl Barnes, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Charleston.

“Overall it is expected to be drier and warmer than normal, but just because we are overall drier and warmer doesn’t mean that we’re not still going to set some potentially record low temperatures or not going to have some really rainy, washout type days,” said Barnes. “It’s just a trend, and like any climate trend it isn’t necessarily reflected in the day to day weather. It is an average over a longer term period.”

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, La Nina events can last anywhere from nine to 12 months.

This story was originally published September 23, 2017 at 8:39 AM with the headline "A La Nina might be coming this winter. What does that mean for the Lowcountry?."