The reason behind the abnormally dry Vancouver weather this month
While we’ve been experiencing some typically gloomy Vancouver weather as of late, the first few weeks of October were quite atypical.
Daily Hive spoke with Steve Boily from Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) to learn just how much Vancouver weather has deviated from the norm lately.
Boily caveated that not all the precipitation has been reported for the month of October, including the rain we’ve experienced since Oct. 27.
However, he said that it still looks like October will see about one-third of what a normal month would in terms of precipitation, when he looked at stations in Vancouver and Pitt Meadows.
Vancouver had recorded just 36 millimetres of rain against a normal of 180 millimetres.
Pitt Meadows had recorded 41 millimetres, with the total expected for the month around 50 to 60 millimetres, compared to a normal of 180 millimetres.
Boily said that there was a series of ridges of high pressure that pushed the lows towards the north coast of B.C. and Alaska and the Yukon.
“So, they didn’t come to our area. So that’s why it was so dry.”
Boily pointed out that in October 2025, the Vancouver area had 151 millimetres of precipitation. In 2024, we saw an atmospheric river that resulted in 188 millimetres of rain over just three days.
October has also been warmer than average.
“[The] average minimum, average maximum, or even average mean are one to two degrees above normal. But it makes sense with all the sun that we had and the little precipitation.”
Not clear if the El Niño is to blame
Boily said that “it’s not completely impossible” that the El Niño influenced this abnormal weather, but that it is “tough to say at this time.”
While the historic ‘super’ El Niño has already started, its effects shouldn’t be felt until winter, Boily said.
An El Niño is a naturally occurring climate pattern, starting when Pacific Ocean waters begin to warm up along the equator, changing the hemispheric circulation patterns across much of the world.
By definition, an El Niño occurs when those water temperatures increase by 0.5°C. It is considered weak when the warming is between 0.5°C and 1°C, and it is considered very strong when the warming is over 2°C.
In fact, most forecast models predict that this El Niño will warm those waters by over 3°C — something that hasn’t happened for at least 100 years.
During normal ocean conditions, winds (called trade winds) blow west across the Pacific Ocean, bringing warm water to Asia and Australia and letting cooler water rise along the west coast of the Americas.
However, when there is an El Niño, the trade winds will weaken or reverse, allowing warm water to move to the Americas, in turn heating the air and changing how clouds and storms form.
During this weather phenomenon, the western half of Canada sees normal or above-normal temperatures in the winter.
In places like Metro Vancouver, this means we can expect to have more winter precipitation in the form of rain instead of snow, which could reduce our snowpack.