INDIANA, USA — The Old Farmer's Almanac has released their 2024-2025 winter weather outlook for the U.S. They are calling for a "cold, wet and snowy" winter for the Great Lakes, including Indiana.
That will probably be pretty accurate. Winters are typically "cold, wet, snowy". Will it be extra cold? Extra wet? Extra snowy? Possibly! We may be forecasting a higher snow potential this year.
How have previous predictions turned out for central Indiana? We took a look at the last 10 years of data from Indianapolis.
Tap HERE to see the latest weather forecast from the 13News weather team.
2024-2025 Old Farmer's Almanac Winter Outlook
The almanac typically releases their outlook in August with books available shortly thereafter. That is why the forecast is released so early.
For the Great Lakes, the forecast is very vague. It calls for cold, wet and white weather. That's fairly vague and will be true no matter what. We will have cold days, we will have wet days and we will have white days. How many of each is still uncertain. For other parts of the country, they have more specific terminology. For example, the High Plains forecast consists of "average snowfall". That is more helpful than saying "snowy".
How accurate is the Old Farmers' Almanac for Indiana?
We looked at the past 10 winters. Most of the time, the almanac wasn't exactly right. It wasn't very specific, either.
In short, the X's indicate that parameter was wrong. Either temperatures were incorrect or snowfall amounts were incorrect. We found the Farmers' Almanac to be right only 25% of the time.
Let's go through the numbers:
2023-2024 Winter: "Cold, Stormy" -- Wrong
17.3 inches of snow below normal
+7 degrees above average for the winter
2022-2023 Winter: "Unreasonably cold, snowy" -- Wrong
-15.5 inches of snow below normal
+7 degrees above average for the winter
2021-2022 Winter: "Icy, Flaky" -- Wrong, but vague
-14.5 inches of snow below normal
+3 degrees above average for the winter
We didn't have notable ice storms that winter, but of course there were icy conditions at times, as does every winter.
2020-2021 Winter: "Cold, Very Flaky" -- Mostly wrong
-1.3 inches of snow below normal (So we were near average for snow, but "very flaky" would seem extra snowy)
+1 degrees above average for the winter (More cold spells this winter but we still were slightly warmer than normal overall)
2019-2020 Winter: "Frozen, snowy" -- Wrong, but also vague
-9.3 inches of snow below normal
+6 degrees above average for the winter
2018-2019 Winter: "Unreasonably cold, snowy" -- Wrong
-15.5 inches of snow below normal
+7 degrees above average for the winter
2017-2018 Winter: "Cold, average snow" -- Correct
-1.3 inches of snow below normal (fairly close to average)
+1 degrees above average for the winter (somewhat accurate)
2016-2017 Winter: "Numbing cold, snowy" -- Wrong
-15.8 inches of snow below normal
+6.4 degrees above average for the winter
2015-2016 Winter: "Snow-filled, frigid" -- Wrong
-10.8 inches of snow below normal
+6 degrees above average for the winter
2014-2015 Winter: "Stinging cold, normal snowfall" -- Correct
-Average snowfall (nailed it)
-2.7 degrees below average for the winter
What are we predicting this winter?
Yes we are also forecasting a "cold, wet, and white" winter. However that doesn't tell us much. Here are a few more thoughts.
We have a La Niña setting up for this winter. Typically we have slightly higher snow chances during a La Niña winter. It's not guaranteed. Generally the northern and eastern parts of Indiana have a 60% chance for above average snow. The southern and western parts only have a 40% chance for above average snow.
That's for more snowfall than average. So generally, the forecast does typically lean snowier for Indiana during a La Niña winter.
Temperature-wise, expect lots of swings with a more active jet stream.
We will have more on our winter outlook in the Fall. This is just an early taste. In the meantime, enjoy the nice summery weather.
-13News Meteorologist Matt Standridge.