Middle Tennessee 2024-2025 winter weather outlook: Here's what to expect

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WKRN) — It doesn't feel like it, but winter is right around the corner. Will this winter be cold and snowy or warm and wet?

Seasonal forecasts are extremely difficult to get correct. It's hard enough to make an accurate forecast for the next 7 days, let alone the next three months.

Meteorologists use several tools to make seasonal forecasts. The best tool for winter forecasting is the El Niño-Southern Oscillation.

The El Niño-Southern Oscillation is an ocean current along the equatorial Pacific. You have likely heard of it called El Niño or La Niña. El Niño is the warm phase and La Niña is the cold phase.

Data going back to the 1950s shows the significant impacts that El Niño and La Niña have on the winters in North America.

Here in Tennessee, the trends aren't as clear as they are for other parts of the country. Typically we have cool and dry winters during El Niño and warm and slightly wetter winters during La Niña.

So what about this winter?

The current sea surface temperatures near the equator in the Pacific Ocean are slightly cooler than normal. This means we are currently in a weak La Niña.

The Climate Prediction Center is forecasting the weak La Niña to continue this winter.

Since we are expected to be in a weak La Niña, let's go back and look at all the winters when the pattern was similar. We can use trends from the previous winters to help make the forecast for the upcoming winter.

The Climate Prediction Center has El Niño and La Niña data going back to 1950. Since 1950 there have been 10 winters that coincided with a weak La Niña.

The slideshow above has those 10 winters circled.

To see if the weak La Niña has any impact on our winters in middle Tennessee, we need to look at the data from each of those 10 winters. We will use the data from Nashville International Airport (BNA) because it goes back far enough and includes temperature, rainfall, and snowfall data.

Below is all the weather data from those winters.

The numbers highlighted in red are above normal and the numbers in blue are below normal.

There are some surprising trends. The most surprising is all 10 years had below-average temperatures. This is unexpected because during a typical La Niña winter this part of the country typically sees above-average temperatures.

Looking back at all the winters when there was a strong La Niña, nearly all of them did feature above-average temperatures. This means the strength of La Niña does have a significant impact on our winter weather.

There is no visible trend in precipitation. Half of the winters had below-average precipitation and half had above-average precipitation.

There is a trend in snowfall. Eight out of 10 winters had above-average snowfall.

Using those trends, here is your 2024-2025 winter outlook.

You can expect slightly cooler than average temperatures. Even though all 10 weak La Niña winters were below normal, the warming climate has caused our wintertime temperatures to warm. The warming climate makes it difficult for us to see well below-average temperatures.

With no clear trend in the precipitation, the forecast is for near-normal amounts.

Middle Tennessee can expect to see above-normal snowfall this winter. This goes against what we typically see during La Niña, but the data shows a clear trend with eight out of 10 weak La Niña winters recording high than normal snowfall.

If you're a snow lover, the data is in your favor!