Pangasinan faces drought until August

LINGAYEN, Pangasinan– This province will likely be under drought by the end of this month until August although less-than-normal rain can still be expected there then.

State-run Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration forecast such scenario, expecting fewer tropical cyclones  due to the prevailing El Niño phenomenon.

“TCs’ contribution to rainfall in Pangasinan won’t be much unlike during times without El Niño,” said Anthony Lucero, Pagagasa’s Climate Monitoring and Prediction Section OIC.

He said fewer TCs also mean there’ll be less of these weather systems to enhance the southwest monsoon or “habagat,” the main driver of rain in Luzon.

Unless enhanced, he said “habagat” won’t bring much rain.

Reduced number of TCs is among El Niño’s impacts on the country.

PAGASA forecast zero to one TC in the Philippines for each of April, May and June this year.

The forecast also showed between one and three possible TCs this July and two to four TCs in each of August and September.

According to PAGASA, drought is a condition marked by three consecutive months of way below-normal rainfall that’s more than 60 percent lesser than average precipitation.

Drought can also be five consecutive months of below-normal rainfall, characterized by 21 percent to 60 percent reduction in average precipitation, said PAGASA.

Such means Pangasinan will still experience some rain during the expected five-month drought there, noted Lucero.

“Pangasinan won’t be totally dry,” he said.

He clarified rainfall there will be lower than average, however.

For April 2016, PAGASA forecast Pangasinan’s rainfall to be some 28 percent of the expected 17.2 mm mean precipitation there then.

PAGASA’s forecast there improved to about 63 percent of 144 mm, 74 percent of almost 285 mm, 61 percent of nearly 294 mm and close to 72 percent of around 470 mm mean precipitation in May, June, July and August this year, respectively.

“We expect rainfall in Pangasinan,” Lucero said, adding that such rainfall would enable people there to still grow crops.

Available models indicate El Niño already entered its decaying stage, PAGASA said earlier.

Some of the models indicate possible transition from El Niño condition to neutral state around mid-2016, Pagasa said further.

Experts said El Niño and the La Niña phenomenon are the corresponding warm and cool phases of a recurring natural climate pattern called El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) across tropical Pacific.

They noted an ENSO-neutral state is one in which conditions are near long-term average. – Philippines News Agency