Forecasters see Northwest as summer’s hot spot

Published 1:30 am Monday, May 25, 2026

The Pacific Northwest has the best chance among all U.S. regions of having a hotter-than-average summer, the National Weather Service said May 21.

Oregon, Idaho and Eastern Washington already are in a drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. The Bureau of Reclamation began rationing water May 21 to irrigators in Central Washington.

Favorable weather could ease the water shortage, but the weather service’s Climate Prediction Center predicts a hot and dry summer throughout Washington, Oregon and Idaho.

The odds are better than 60% that temperatures in June, July and August will be above normal, according to the climate center.

An El Niño, caused by warm ocean waters, likely will form soon, and El Niños tend to make summers warmer in the northern tier of the U.S., forecasters said.

The odds also favor below-average rainfall in Washington, the Idaho Panhandle and the northern tier of Oregon. It’s a tossup elsewhere in Oregon and Idaho.

Chance of El Niño

The weather service has yet to declare an El Niño, but signs point to one forming soon. The Pacific Ocean along the equator is warming up.

There is a two out of three chance a “strong El Niño” will form in the fall, according to the climate center. National reporting has been trending toward it becoming the strongest El Niño in nearly 30 years, potentially a “super” event.

Northwest winters are usually warm during an El Niño, resulting in small snowpacks.

While ordinary moderate El Niños typically mean warmer and drier winters for the Pacific Northwest, super El Niños sometimes deliver massive precipitation amounts to Washington and Oregon. Because the subtropical jet stream becomes a roaring “firehose” of moisture, these uncommon El Niños can trigger powerful, warm atmospheric rivers and intense, warm downpours.

“For the region’s salmon populations, a Super El Niño is a double blow. In the ocean, the lack of nutrient-rich, cold upwelling cripples the marine food web they rely on to mature. When they return to spawn, they face low, critically warm river systems and barrier-like thermal blocks in coastal estuaries,” according to an analysis by artificial intelligence.