Summary of Rainfall and
El Niņo in California
 Jan Null, CCM
Revised October 2004

 

Below is a summary of the number of occurrences of varying amounts of rainfall in California sorted by the strength of the El Niņo signal.  The amounts are categorized by the Percent of Normal (PON) rainfall for three key cities and for the California Department of Water Resources "8 Station Index" (an average of precipitation totals for Mt. Shasta City, Shasta Dam, Brush Creek, Mineral Ranger Station, Quincy, Sierraville Ranger Station, Blue Canyon and Pacific House).   The classification of El Niņo events used here is based on "El Niņo & La Niņa Years: A Consensus List".

Number of Occurrences by PON Categories

WEAK-MOD

 <80% 80-100% 100-120% 120-140% >140%
Eureka 3 3 1 1 1
San Francisco 3 2 1 2 1
Sacramento 4 2 0 1 2
Fresno 3 2 1 1 2
Los Angeles 3 1 1 0 4
8 Station Index 4 0 2 3 0

MODERATE-STRONG

 <80% 80-100% 100-120% 120-140% >140%
Eureka 0 1 0 2 0
San Francisco 0 1 0 0 2
Sacramento 1 0 0 1 1
Fresno 1 0 0 0 2
Los Angeles 0 1 0 0 2
8 Station Index 1 0 0 1 1

STRONG

 <80% 80-100% 100-120% 120-140% >140%
Eureka 0 2 0 0 2
San Francisco 1 0 0 0 3
Sacramento 1 0 0 0 3
Fresno 1 0 0 1 2
Los Angeles 0 0 0 0 4
8 Station Index 1 0 1 0 2

PON Rainfall by Season*

Category Season EKA SF SAC FAT LA 8SI
weak-mod 1951 122 150 133 127 177 137
1952 120 97 91 88 64 104
1953 109 66 75 81 81 95
1954 86 73 83 94 81 70
1955 120 126 142 122 108 141
1956 94 69 77 75 64 86
mod-strong 1957 126 169 160 173 142 139
1958 84 48 61 63 38 74
1959 89 71 73 73 55 84
1960 114 64 70 63 33 74
1961 75 82 97 104 127 87
1962 113 102 140 106 57 123
weak-mod 1963 97 57 70 62 53 69
1964 105 103 102 102 92 121
strong 1965 83 75 58 56 138 74
1966 114 136 147 137 148 121
1967 73 67 66 66 112 74
1968 122 116 134 210 185 131
weak-mod 1969 99 96