Those hoping to pack away their umbrellas soon may have to wait a while longer as the La Niña pattern could persist into spring, two new US-led forecasts suggest.
The new modelling was released by Columbia University’s International Research Institute for Climate and Society (IRI) and the US Climate Prediction Centre (CPC) last week.

“According to the latest IRI/CPC model forecast, La Niña has a 62 percent chance of persisting through the southern hemisphere winter and a 58 percent chance of occurring in spring,” Weatherzone said.
Should the pattern persist as predicted, the likelihood of above-average rain in parts of Australia would increase across winter and spring.


It comes after Sydney was confirmed to have had more wet days than dry ones this year with 94 of 142 recording rain.
Two factors are driving the new forecasts.

Sea surface temperatures are “near or exceeding La Niña thresholds in late winter, and secondly, a negative Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD)appears to be developing over the coming months.

Towns cut off by floodwaters for second time this year
“In fact, a number of forecast models suggest that we could see a strong negative IOD this winter and spring.”