Warm winter weather again this year

El Niņo gets much of the credit

By FRITZ MAYER

RIVER VALLEY — It’s January and that should mean it’s time to break out the snowmobiles. But this year, like last year, winter is warmer than usual, with local daytime highs in the 50s and 60s, instead of hovering in the 20s and 30s. Records are being shattered all across the Northeast.

On Saturday, January 6, the temperature in Monticello, NY was 62 degrees, as it was in Honesdale, PA. In New York City’s Central Park, the mercury climbed to an astonishing 72 degrees.

The Northeast weather, in fact, has been warm enough to affect the world oil market. For a brief time over the past weekend, the price of crude oil futures dropped below $55 per barrel, down from an all-time high of about $80 per barrel. Unfortunately, consumers who use oil to heat their homes won’t see a dramatic drop in oil prices any time soon.

Frank Bannan, general manager of Lakewood Oil in Honesdale, PA, said, “So far, we haven’t seen any benefits from it.” He said it usually takes three months for that kind of price drop to reach the Northeast home-heating market. Still, oil customers are using far less fuel than they would in an average year, so the warm weather does provide some benefit to his customers.

That welcomed bit of news, however, is offset by the strain the weather puts on the local economy. “People aren’t coming to the area for the snow or the snowmobiles. The warm weather is hurting everyone. It’s even too warm to make snow,” Bannan said.

A call to Holiday Mountain Ski and Fun Park in Rock Hill confirmed Bannan’s assessment. So far, the beginner’s slope is open; all other slopes are closed because of lack of snow.

Bannan remarked that forecasters had called for the warm weather to hang on through the middle of the month. “That means the season will only last about six weeks,” he said, compared with 12 weeks or more of a typical winter in this region.

Tricia Funaro of Rent-E-Quip in Honesdale, PA said that while the center has not been renting any snowmobiles lately, there is an upside to the weather. She said, “All the other equipment is still going out, dozers and excavators.” Construction activity has remained brisk as workers take advantage of the balmy days. The month of December was the warmest December on record in this part of the country.

So, just what is responsible for the abnormally high temperatures that have plants pushing tentative new shoots up well ahead of schedule?

Part of the answer, according to the National Weather Service (NWS), is that the phenomenon called “El Niņo” is once again active. El Niņo is a periodic warming of waters in the Pacific Ocean off South America that affects weather patterns throughout North America and results in higher Northeast temperatures.

Still, given the recent weather-related news, it’s easy to speculate that something beyond El Niņo is at play here. There has been no snow in Central Park this season, which is an event that has never happened before as far as anyone can remember. Just last month, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced that it is going to consider placing polar bears on the threatened species list—it seems that polar ice, which provides a crucial part of the bear’s habitat, is simply melting away.

Climatologists warn that it’s not wise to connect any particular weather event with global climate change—be it an intense hurricane or a long winter warm spell. Climate change takes place gradually, a degree at a time over decades.

Still, eight of the 12 warmest years on record have occurred since 1990. David Robinson, a climatologist at Rutgers University, said, “You can’t explain this without including the effect of greenhouse gases.”

At press time, winter-like temperatures had descended on the area, but the National Weather Service is predicting that temperatures will be above average for the next three months.