ROANOKE, Va. – It’s only officially been spring for a little over a month now, but experts at the Climate Prediction Center are looking ahead to summer 2020 already. While we’ve been fairly cool and wet in recent weeks, their outlook calls for warmer-than-average temperatures across much of the United States. This includes a higher probability of that in Virginia.
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The reasoning has to do with long-term trends of warming summers over the years, but also cooling in the eastern Pacific Ocean. This would imply “ridging” over the eastern U.S., which is a sign of more prolonged warmth (something we haven’t seen happen yet).
Provided that that ridge sets up farther east, that would imply more moisture moving up from the Gulf. That, in combination with the more active tropical season that’s been forecast by multiple universities and private sector meteorologists, sets us up for a wetter-than-average summer as well.
Of course, it’s impossible at this point to tell the weather for specific days. These kinds of outlooks are more an indication on the summer as a whole. For the day-to-day forecast, make sure to check back with us here.