Expect severe winter in East: forecaster
HOUSTON (Reuters) - The eastern United States could be on the verge of its coldest, snowiest winter since at least 2003-04, and homeowners should brace for huge heating bills if oil prices stay high, private forecaster AccuWeather said on Wednesday.
"Given this economic environment, the winter will push some homeowners to the brink," said AccuWeather long-range forecaster Joe Bastardi, referring to the credit crisis and oil prices which are substantially higher than last year.
Elsewhere in the nation, winter should be less severe this year than last, with the Midwest less snowy and the West mostly warmer. The Northwest could see above-average snowfall, AccuWeather said.
Winter will start early this year, with December bringing perhaps the most severe weather of the season, Bastardi said. There should be a warm-up in January followed by another bout of severe weather in late January or early February, he said.
"In the eastern half of the nation, people will look at the bookends of cold," Bastardi said.
The last cold winter in New York City was 2003-04, when the average temperature for the season was 2 degrees Fahrenheit below normal. "I think we're normal to comparably cold in the Northeast this year," he said.
Bastardi said he only predicts the weather, not the economy, so he is reluctant to guess the impact on consumers of more demand for natural gas and heating oil.
"I don't predict prices," Bastardi said. "Oil could go to $50 for all I know. What I will say is there will be more demand, in the areas east of the Mississippi, plus Oklahoma, Arkansas, Texas and Louisiana," he said.
Bastardi said he bases his forecasts on patterns from the past as well as evidence of shifts in ocean temperatures in the present.
Active U.S. Gulf Coast hurricane seasons, as 2008 turned out to be, have tended to precede cold winters. The Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico are cooler than in the recent past, which could influence winter weather, he said.
(Reporting by Bruce Nichols; editing by Jim Marshall)
