Weather experts predict a warmer than normal winter

After all that, the fall of 2009 came out....average, pretty much.

“A really nice September, a really cold, wet October, a really mild November” added up to the 64th-warmest and 36th-wettest autumn out of 137 statewide, State Climatologist Harry Hillaker said.

Daily temperatures in Cedar Rapids and Iowa City were near average for the season - Cedar Rapids' mean daily temperature for fall was precisely statistically average - and both cities saw just over an inch more rain than usual (see chart). The statistics mask a near-perfect month for harvest after that damp October.

“Almost the whole state was below normal (in rainfall) for the month,” Hillaker said. “The good news was the first half of November was extremely dry. The second half of the month was fairly average, but we got the break that we needed and we got it in a fairly big way.”

Traditionalists may wait until the Dec. 21 winter solstice, but climatologists mark the seasons by the calendar. They're already in winter, and this weekend should feel like it, although the predicted lows are slightly warmer than the historic average.

For the rest of the winter?

“Pretty good odds, warmer than normal,” based on the presence of an El Nino current pattern in the Pacific Ocean, Hillaker said.

Still, it is winter.

“(People) translate that to mean we're not going to have a winter, but warmer than normal in Iowa is pretty darn cold by most standards,” Hillaker said. “Typically the way it works out, we'll get one month that averages out colder than normal.”