Author: S. Gerasimov
On April 18, 1998, the newspaper “World of News” published an article by N. Varfolomeeva “Moscow snowfall and the mystery of the El Niño phenomenon” which stated: “...We have not yet learned to be scared at the word El Niño... It is El Niño that is a threat to life on the planet ... The El Niño phenomenon has been practically unstudied, its nature is unclear, it cannot be predicted, which means it is, in the full sense of the word, a time bomb... If efforts are not immediately made to clarify the nature of this strange phenomenon, humanity cannot be sure of the future " Agree that all this looks quite ominous, it’s just scary. Unfortunately, everything that is described in the newspaper is not fiction, not a cheap sensation to increase the circulation of the publication. El Niño is a real unpredictable natural phenomenon - a warm current so affectionately named.
"El Niño" means "baby" or "little boy" in Spanish. This tender name originated in Peru, where local fishermen have long been faced with an incomprehensible mystery of nature: in other years, the water in the ocean suddenly heats up and moves away from the shores. And this happens just before Christmas. That's why the Peruvians connected their miracle with the Christian mystery of Christmas: in Spanish, El Niño is the name for the Holy Child Christ. True, before it did not bring such troubles as it does now. Why does a phenomenon sometimes demonstrate its full strength, while in other cases it shows almost no effect? And what caused the Peruvian miracle, the consequences of which are very serious and sad?
For 20 years now, an entire scientific army has been exploring the space between Indonesia and South America. 13 meteorological ships, replacing each other, are constantly in these waters. Many buoys are equipped with instruments to measure water temperature from the surface to a depth of 400 meters. Seven planes and five satellites are patrolling the skies over the ocean to get an overall picture of the state of the atmosphere, including understanding the mysterious natural phenomenon El Niño. This occasionally occurring warm current off the coast of Peru and Ecuador is associated with the occurrence of unfavorable weather disasters around the world. It is difficult to follow it - this is not the Gulf Stream, stubbornly moving along a set route for thousands of years. And El Niño occurs, like a jack-in-the-box, every three to seven years. From the outside it looks like this: from time to time in the Pacific Ocean - from the coast of Peru all the way to the islands of Oceania - a very warm giant current appears, covering the total area equal to area USA – about 100 million km2. It extends with a long, tapering sleeve. Over this vast space, as a result of increased evaporation, colossal energy is pumped into the atmosphere. The El Niño effect releases energy with a capacity of 450 million megawatts, which is equal to the total capacity of 300 thousand large nuclear power plants. It's like one more thing - an extra one - the Sun rises from the Pacific Ocean, heating our planet! And then here, as if in a giant cauldron, between America and Asia, the signature climatic dishes of the year are cooked.
Naturally, the first to celebrate its “birth” are Peruvian fishermen. They are concerned about the disappearance of schools of sardines off the coast. Immediate cause The departure of the fish lies, as it turns out, in the disappearance of food. Sardines, and not only them, feed on phytoplankton, a component of which is microscopic algae. And algae needs sunlight and nutrients, primarily nitrogen and phosphorus. They are present in ocean water, and their supply in the upper layer is constantly replenished by vertical currents going from the bottom to the surface. But when the El Niño current turns back towards South America, its warm waters “lock” the exit of deep waters. Biogenic elements do not rise to the surface, and algae reproduction stops. The fish leave these places - they do not have enough food. But sharks appear. They also react to “problems” in the ocean: bloodthirsty robbers are attracted by the water temperature - it rises by 5-9 ° C. It is precisely this sharp increase in the temperature of the surface layer of water in the eastern Pacific Ocean (in the tropical and central parts) that is the El phenomenon. Niño. What's happening to the ocean?
IN normal years Warm surface ocean waters are transported and retained by easterly winds - the trade winds - in the western zone of the tropical Pacific Ocean, where the so-called tropical warm pool (TTB) is formed. It should be noted that the depth of this warm layer of water reaches 100-200 meters. The formation of such a huge heat reservoir is the main thing necessary condition birth of El Niño. At the same time, as a result of the surge of water, the sea level off the coast of Indonesia is two feet higher than off the coast of South America. At the same time, the water surface temperature in the west in the tropical zone averages +29-30° C, and in the east +22-24° C. A slight cooling of the surface in the east is the result of the rise of deep cold waters to the ocean surface due to water suction trade winds. At the same time, the largest region of heat and stationary unstable equilibrium in the ocean-atmosphere system is formed above the TTB in the atmosphere (when all forces are balanced and the TTB is motionless).
For unknown reasons, once every three to seven years the trade winds suddenly weaken, the balance is upset and the warm waters of the western basin rush east, creating one of the strongest warm currents in the World Ocean. Over a vast area in the eastern Pacific Ocean, in the tropical and central equatorial parts, there is a sharp increase in the temperature of the surface layer of the ocean. This is the onset of El Niño. Its beginning was marked by a long onslaught of squalls western winds. They replace the usual weak trade winds over the warm western part of the Pacific Ocean and block the rise of cold deep waters to the surface, that is, the normal circulation of water in the World Ocean is disrupted. Unfortunately, such a scientific, dry explanation of the causes is nothing compared to the consequences.
But then a giant “baby” was born. His every “breath”, every “wave of his little hand” causes processes that are global in nature. El Niño is usually accompanied by ecological disasters: droughts, fires, heavy rains causing flooding of vast areas densely populated areas, which leads to the death of people and the destruction of livestock and crops in different areas of the Earth. El Niño also has a significant impact on the state of the global economy. According to American specialists, in 1982-1983, the economic damage from his “pranks” in the United States amounted to 13 billion dollars and killed from one and a half to two thousand people, and according to the estimates of the world’s leading insurance company Munich Re, the damage in 1997-1998 is estimated at 34 billion dollars and 24 thousand human lives.
Drought and rain, hurricanes, tornadoes and snowfalls are the main satellites of El Niño. All this, as if on command, falls to the Earth in unison. During his “coming” in 1997-1998, fires turned the tropical forests of Indonesia into ashes, and then raged across the vast expanses of Australia. They reached the outskirts of Melbourne. The ashes flew to New Zealand - 2000 kilometers away. Tornadoes swept through places where they had never been. Sunny California was attacked by “Nora” - a tornado (as a tornado is called in the USA) of unprecedented size - 142 kilometers in diameter. He rushed over Los Angeles, almost tearing the roofs off the Hollywood film studios. Two weeks later, another tornado, Pauline, struck Mexico. The famous resort of Acapulco was attacked by ten-meter ocean waves - buildings were destroyed, the streets were littered with debris, garbage and beach furniture. The floods did not spare South America either. Hundreds of thousands of Peruvian peasants fled from the onset of water that fell from the sky, their fields were lost, flooded with mud. Where streams used to gurgle, turbulent streams rushed through. The Chilean Atacama Desert, which has always been so unusually dry that NASA tested its Mars rover there, was hit by torrential rains. Catastrophic floods were also observed in Africa.
In other parts of the planet, climate turmoil has also brought misfortune. In New Guinea, one of the largest islands on the planet, mainly in its eastern part, the land is cracked by heat and drought. Tropical greenery dried up, wells were left without water, crops died. Half a thousand people died of hunger. There was a threat of a cholera epidemic.
Usually a “little boy” frolics for about 18 months, so the planet has time to change seasons several times. It makes itself felt not only in summer, but also in winter. And if at the turn of 1982-1983 in the village of Paradise (USA) 28 m 57 cm of snow fell in a year, then in the winter season of 1998/99, thanks to the El Niño phenomenon, drifts of 29 meters grew in a few days at the ski base on Mount Baker 13 cm.
And if you think that these cataclysms do not affect the vast expanses of Europe, Siberia or Far East, then you are deeply mistaken. Everything that happens in the Pacific Ocean reverberates throughout the planet. This is a monstrous snowfall in Moscow, and 11 floods of the Neva - a record for three hundred years of the existence of St. Petersburg, and +20 ° C in October in Western Siberia. It was then that scientists began to speak with alarm about the retreat of the border permafrost on North.
And if earlier meteorologists and other specialists did not know what caused such a “collapse” in the weather, now the cause of all disasters is considered to be the return movement of the El Niño current in the Pacific Ocean. They study it up and down, but cannot squeeze it into any framework. Scientists just shrug their shoulders – this is an anomalous climate phenomenon.
And what’s most interesting is that they paid attention to this phenomenon only in the last 100 years. But, as it turns out, the mysterious El Niño has existed for many millions of years. Thus, archaeologist M. Moseli claims that 1100 years ago a powerful current, or rather the natural disasters generated by it, destroyed the system of irrigation canals and thereby destroyed a highly developed culture big state in Peru. Humanity simply had not previously associated these natural disasters. Scientists began to carefully analyze everything connected with the “baby”, and even studied his “pedigree”.
The Huon Peninsula in the island area was chosen to reveal the secrets of El Niño. New Guinea. It consists of a series of terraces coral reef. Part of this island is constantly rising due to tectonic movement, and thus bringing to the surface samples of coral reef that are approximately 130,000 years old. Analysis of isotopic and chemical data from these ancient corals helped scientists identify 14 climate “windows” of 20-100 years each. Cold (40,000 years ago) and warm periods (125,000 years ago) were analyzed in order to assess the characteristics of the flow in different climatic regimes. The coral samples obtained indicate that El Nino used to be not as intense as it has been in the last hundred years. Here are the years in which its anomalous activity was recorded: 1864,1871,1877-1878,1884,1891,1899,1911-1912, 1925-1926, 1939-1941, 1957-1958, 1965-1966, 1972, 1976, 1982 -1983, 1986-1987, 1992-1993, 1997-1998, 2002-2003. As you can see, the El Niño “phenomenon” is happening more often, lasting longer and causing more and more trouble. The periods from 1982 to 1983 and from 1997 to 1998 are considered the most intense.
The discovery of the El Niño phenomenon is considered the event of the century. After extensive research, scientists have discovered that the warm western basin typically enters an opposite phase, called La Niña, a year after an El Niño, when the eastern Pacific Ocean cools 5 degrees Celsius below average. Then recovery processes begin to take effect, bringing cold fronts to the western North American coast, accompanied by hurricanes, tornadoes and thunderstorms. That is, the destructive forces continue their work. It was noted that 13 El Niño periods accounted for 18 La Niña phases. Scientists were only able to verify that the distribution of TTB anomalies in the study area does not correspond to normal and therefore the empirical probability of the occurrence of La Niña is 1.7 times greater than the probability of the occurrence of El Niño.
The causes and increasing intensity of reverse currents still remain a mystery to researchers. Climatologists often benefit from historical materials in their research. Australian scientist William de la Mare, having studied old reports from whalers from 1931 to 1986 (when whaling was banned), determined that the hunt, as a rule, ended at the edge of the forming ice. Figures show that the summer ice limit from the mid-fifties to the early seventies shifted in latitude by 3°, that is, approximately 1000 kilometers to the south (we are talking about the Southern Hemisphere). This result coincides with the opinion of scientists who recognize the warming of the globe as a result of human activity. German scientist M. Latif from the Institute of Meteorology in Hamburg suggests that the disturbing influence of El Niño is increasing due to the increasing greenhouse effect. Unpleasant news about rapid warming is coming from the shores of Alaska: the glacier has become hundreds of meters thinner, salmon have changed their spawning time, beetles that have multiplied due to the heat are devouring the forest. Both polar caps of the planet are causing concern among scientists. However, representatives of science did not agree on the answer to the global question: does the “greenhouse effect” in the Earth’s atmosphere affect the intensity of El Niño?
But experts have learned to predict the arrival of the “baby.” And perhaps that is the only reason why the damage of the last two cycles did not have such tragic consequences. Thus, a group of Russian scientists from the Obninsk Institute of Experimental Meteorology, led by V. Pudov, proposed a new approach to predicting El Niño. They decided to develop the already well-known idea that the emergence of currents is associated with the development of tropical cyclones in the area Philippine Sea. Both typhoons and El Niño are consequences of the accumulation of excess heat in the surface layer of the ocean. The difference between these phenomena is in scale: typhoons release excess heat many times a year, and El Niño - once every few years. It was also noticed that before El Niño forms, the ratio of atmospheric pressure always changes in two points: in Tahiti and in Darwin, Australia. It was precisely this fluctuation in the pressure ratio that turned out to be stable sign, by which meteorologists can now learn in advance about the approach of the “menacing baby.”
edited news VENDETTA - 20-10-2010, 13:02
Australian meteorologists are sounding the alarm: in the next year or two, the world will face extreme weather, provoked by the activation of the circular equatorial Pacific current El Niño, which, in turn, can provoke natural disasters, crop failures,
diseases and civil wars.
El Niño, a circular current previously known only to narrow specialists, became TOP news in 1998/99, when in December 1997 it suddenly became abnormally active and changed the usual weather in the Northern Hemisphere for a whole year in advance. Then all summer thunderstorms flooded the Crimea and Black Sea resorts, the tourist and mountaineering season was disrupted in the Carpathians and the Caucasus, and in the cities of Central and Western Europe(Baltics, Transcarpathia, Poland, Germany, Britain, Italy etc.) in spring, autumn and winter
there were long-term floods with considerable (tens of thousands) human casualties:
True, climatologists and meteorologists figured out to connect these weather disasters with the activation of El Niño only a year later, when it was all over. Then we learned that El Niño is a warm circular current (more correctly, a countercurrent) that occurs periodically in the equatorial region of the Pacific Ocean: 
El Niña's place on the world map
And that in Spanish this name means “girl” and this girl has a twin brother La Niño - also a circular, but cold Pacific current. Together, replacing each other, these hyperactive children play pranks so that the whole world shakes with fear. But the sister is still in charge of the robber family duo: 
El Niño and La Niño are twin currents with opposite characters.
They work in shifts
Temperature map of Pacific waters during El Niño and La Niño activation
In the second half of last year, meteorologists predicted with 80% probability a new violent manifestation of the El Niño phenomenon. But it only appeared in February 2015. This was announced by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The activity of El Niño and La Niño is cyclical and is associated with cosmic cycles of solar activity.
At least that's what was previously thought. Now much of El Niño’s behavior no longer fits
according to the standard theory, activation has almost doubled in frequency. It is very possible that increased activity
El Niño is caused by global warming. In addition to the fact that El Niño itself affects atmospheric transport, it (even more importantly) changes the nature and strength of other Pacific - permanent - currents. And then - according to the domino law: the entire familiar climate map of the planet collapses. 
Typical diagram of the tropical water cycle in the Pacific Ocean
On December 19, 1997, El Niño intensified and lasted for the whole year
changed the climate of the entire planet
The rapid activation of El Niño is caused by a slight (from a human point of view) increase in the temperature of surface waters in the eastern Pacific Ocean near the equator off the coast of Central and South America. Peruvian fishermen were the first to notice this phenomenon at the end of the 19th century. Their catches periodically disappeared and their fishing business collapsed. It turned out that as the water temperature increases, the oxygen content in it and the amount of plankton decreases, which leads to the death of fish and, accordingly, a sharp reduction in catches.
The influence of El Niño on the climate of our planet is not yet fully understood. However, many scientists agree
on the fact that during El Niño the number of extreme events increases weather phenomena. Yes, during
El Niño in 1997-1998 in many countries in winter months there was abnormally warm weather,
which caused the aforementioned floods.
One of the consequences of weather disasters is epidemics of malaria, dengue fever and other diseases. At the same time, westerly winds carry rain and floods into the desert. El Niño arrivals are believed to contribute to military and social conflicts in countries affected by this natural phenomenon.
Some scientists argue that between 1950 and 2004, El Niño doubled the likelihood of civil wars.
It is known for certain that during El Niño activation the frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones increases. And the current state of affairs is in good agreement with this theory. “In the Indian Ocean, where the cyclone season should already be coming to an end, two vortices are developing at once. And in the northwest Pacific Ocean, where the tropical cyclone season is just beginning in April, 5 similar vortices have already appeared, which is approximately a fifth of the the entire seasonal norm of cyclones,” reports the website meteonovosti.ru.
Where and how else the weather will react to the new activation of El Niño, meteorologists cannot yet say for sure.
but they are already sure of one thing: the world’s population is again waiting abnormally warm year with wet and capricious weather (2014 is recognized as the warmest in the history of meteorological observations; it is very likely that it
and provoked the current rapid activation of the hyperactive “girl”).
Moreover, usually the vagaries of El Niño last 6-8 months, but now they can drag on for 1-2 years.
Anatoly Khortitsky
The first time I heard the word “El Niño” was in the United States in 1998. At that time, this natural phenomenon was well known to Americans, but almost unknown in our country. And it’s not surprising, because El Niño originates in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of South America and greatly influences the weather in the southern states of the United States. El Niño(translated from Spanish El Niño- baby, boy) in the terminology of climatologists - one of the phases of the so-called Southern Oscillation, i.e. fluctuations in the temperature of the surface layer of water in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, during which the area of heated surface water shifts to the east. (For reference: the opposite phase of oscillation - the displacement of surface waters to the west - is called La Niña (La Nina- baby, girl)). The El Niño phenomenon, which occurs periodically in the ocean, greatly affects the climate of the entire planet. One of the largest El Niño events occurred in 1997-1998. It was so strong that it attracted the attention of the world community and the press. At the same time, theories about the connection of the Southern Oscillation with global climate change spread. According to experts, the warming phenomenon El Niño is one of the main driving forces natural variability in our climate.
In 2015 The World Meteorological Organization reported that the emerging ahead of schedule and dubbed the "Bruce Lee" El Niño could be one of the strongest since 1950. Its appearance was expected last year, based on data on rising air temperatures, but these models did not materialize, and El Niño did not manifest itself.
In early November, the American agency NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) released a detailed report on the state of the Southern Oscillation and analyzed the possible development of El Niño in 2015-2016. The report is published on the NOAA website. In conclusions of this document It is said that currently there are all the conditions for the formation of El Niño, the average surface temperature of the equatorial part of the Pacific Ocean (SST) has increased values and continues to rise. The probability that El Niño will develop throughout the winter of 2015-2016 is 95% . A gradual decline of El Niño is predicted in the spring of 2016. The report published an interesting graph showing the change in SST since 1951. The blue areas correspond to low temperatures(La Niña), orange shows elevated temperatures (El Niño). The previous strong increase in SST of 2°C was observed in 1998.
Data obtained in October 2015 indicate that the SST anomaly at the epicenter already reaches 3 °C.
Although the causes of El Niño are not yet fully understood, it is known that it begins with trade winds weakening over several months. A series of waves move across the Pacific Ocean along the equator and create a body of warm water off South America, where the ocean normally has low temperatures due to the rise of deep ocean waters to the surface. Weakening trade winds coupled with strong westerly winds could also create a pair of cyclones (south and north of the equator), which is another sign of a future El Niño.
While studying the causes of El Niño, geologists noticed that the phenomenon occurs in the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean, where a powerful rift system has formed. American researcher D. Walker found a clear connection between increased seismicity on the East Pacific Rise and El Niño. Russian scientist G. Kochemasov saw another curious detail: the relief fields of ocean warming almost one to one repeat the structure of the earth's core.
One of the interesting versions belongs to the Russian scientist - Doctor of Geological and Mineralogical Sciences Vladimir Syvorotkin. It was first expressed back in 1998. According to the scientist, powerful centers of hydrogen-methane degassing are located in hot spots of the ocean. Or simply - sources of constant release of gases from the bottom. Their visible signs- thermal water outlets, black and white smokers. In the area of the coast of Peru and Chile, during El Niño years there is a massive release of hydrogen sulfide. The water is boiling and there is a terrible smell. At the same time, an amazing power is pumped into the atmosphere: approximately 450 million megawatts.
The El Niño phenomenon is now being studied and discussed more and more intensively. A team of researchers from the German National Center for Geosciences concluded that mysterious disappearance Mayan civilization in Central America may have been caused by strong climate changes caused by El Niño. At the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries AD, the two largest civilizations of that time ceased to exist on opposite ends of the earth almost simultaneously. It's about about the Mayan Indians and the fall of the Chinese Tang Dynasty, which was followed by a period of internecine strife. Both civilizations were located in monsoon regions, the moisture of which depends on seasonal precipitation. However, the time came when rainy season was unable to provide enough moisture for the development of agriculture. The drought and subsequent famine led to the decline of these civilizations, researchers believe. Scientists came to these conclusions by studying the nature of sedimentary deposits in China and Mesoamerica dating back to this period. The last emperor of the Tang Dynasty died in 907 AD, and the last known Mayan calendar dates back to 903.
Climatologists and meteorologists say that El Niño2015, which will peak between November 2015 and January 2016, will be one of the strongest. El Niño will lead to large-scale disturbances in atmospheric circulation, which could cause droughts in traditionally wet regions and floods in dry ones.
A phenomenal phenomenon, which is considered one of the manifestations of the developing El Niño, is now observed in South America. The Atacama Desert, which is located in Chile and is one of the driest places on Earth, is covered with flowers.
This desert is rich in deposits of saltpeter, iodine, table salt and copper, there has been no significant precipitation here for four centuries. The reason is that the Peruvian current cools the lower layers of the atmosphere and creates temperature inversion which prevents precipitation. Rain falls here once every few decades. However, in 2015, the Atacama was hit by unusually heavy rainfall. As a result, dormant bulbs and rhizomes (horizontally growing underground roots) sprouted. The faded plains of the Atacama were covered with yellow, red, violet and white flowers - nolans, beaumaries, rhodophials, fuchsias and hollyhocks. The desert first bloomed in March, after unexpectedly intense rains caused flooding in the Atacama and killed about 40 people. Now the plants have bloomed for the second time in a year, before the start of the southern summer.
What will El Niño 2015 bring? A powerful El Niño is expected to bring welcome rainfall to dry areas of the United States. In other countries, its effect may be the opposite. In the western Pacific Ocean, El Niño creates high atmospheric pressure, bringing dry and sunny weather to large areas of Australia, Indonesia, and sometimes even India. The impact of El Niño on Russia has so far been limited. It is believed that under influenced by El Niño in October 1997, temperatures rose above 20 degrees in Western Siberia, and then they started talking about the retreat of permafrost to the north. In August 2000, Emergencies Ministry specialists attributed the series of hurricanes and rainstorms that swept across the country to the impact of the El Niño phenomenon.
The Southern Oscillation and El Niño are a global ocean-atmospheric phenomenon. Being characteristic feature Pacific Ocean, El Niño and La Niña are temperature fluctuations in surface waters in the tropical eastern Pacific Ocean. The names of these phenomena, borrowed from Spanish local residents and first introduced into scientific use in 1923 by Gilbert Thomas Volker, mean “baby” and “little one,” respectively. Their influence on the climate of the southern hemisphere is difficult to overestimate. The Southern Oscillation (the atmospheric component of the phenomenon) reflects monthly or seasonal fluctuations in the difference in air pressure between the island of Tahiti and the city of Darwin in Australia.The circulation named after Volcker is a significant aspect of the Pacific phenomenon ENSO (El Nino Southern Oscillation). ENSO is many interacting parts of one global system ocean-atmospheric climate fluctuations that occur as a sequence of oceanic and atmospheric circulations. ENSO is the world's best known source of interannual weather and climate variability (3 to 8 years). ENSO has signatures in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Oceans.
In the Pacific, during significant warm events, El Niño warms up, expands into much of the Pacific tropics, and becomes directly related to SOI intensity. southern oscillation). While ENSO events occur primarily between the Pacific and Indian Oceans, ENSO events in the Atlantic Ocean lag behind the former by 12 to 18 months. Most of the countries that experience ENSO events are developing ones, with economies that are heavily dependent on the agricultural and fishing sectors. New capabilities to predict the onset of ENSO events in three oceans could have global socioeconomic implications. Since ENSO is a global and natural part of the Earth's climate, it is important to know whether changes in intensity and frequency could be a result of global warming. Low frequency changes have already been detected. Interdecadal ENSO modulations may also exist.
El Niño and La Niña
Common Pacific pattern. Equatorial winds collect a warm pool of water to the west. Cold waters rise to the surface along the South American coast.AND La Niña officially defined as long-lasting marine surface temperature anomalies greater than 0.5 °C crossing the central tropical Pacific Ocean. When a condition of +0.5 °C (-0.5 °C) is observed for a period of up to five months, it is classified as an El Niño (La Niña) condition. If the anomaly persists for five months or longer, it is classified as an El Niño (La Niña) episode. The latter occurs at irregular intervals of 2-7 years and usually lasts one or two years.
Increase in air pressure over the Indian Ocean, Indonesia and Australia.
A drop in air pressure over Tahiti and the rest of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean.
Trade winds in the South Pacific are weakening or heading east.
Warm air appears near Peru, causing rain in the deserts.
Warm water spreads from the western part of the Pacific Ocean to the eastern. It brings rain with it, causing it to occur in areas that are usually dry.
Warm El Niño current, consisting of plankton-poor tropical water and heated by its eastern flow in the Equatorial Current, replaces the cold, plankton-rich waters of the Humboldt Current, also known as the Peruvian Current, which contains large populations commercial fish. Most years, the warming lasts only a few weeks or months, after which weather patterns return to normal and fish catches increase. However, when El Niño conditions last for several months, more extensive ocean warming occurs and its economic impact on local fisheries for the external market can be severe.
The Volcker circulation is visible on the surface as easterly trade winds, which move water and air heated by the sun westward. It also creates oceanic upwelling off the coasts of Peru and Ecuador, bringing cold plankton-rich waters to the surface, increasing fish populations. The western equatorial Pacific Ocean is characterized by warm, humid weather and low atmospheric pressure. The accumulated moisture falls in the form of typhoons and storms. As a result, in this place the ocean is 60 cm higher than in its eastern part.
In the Pacific Ocean, La Niña is characterized by unusually cold temperatures in the eastern equatorial region compared to El Niño, which in turn is characterized by unusually warm temperatures in the same region. Atlantic tropical cyclone activity in general case intensifies during La Niña. A La Niña condition often occurs after an El Niño, especially when the latter is very strong.
Southern Oscillation Index (SOI)
The Southern Oscillation Index is calculated from monthly or seasonal fluctuations in the air pressure difference between Tahiti and Darwin.Long-lasting negative SOI values often signal El Niño episodes. These negative values typically accompany continued warming of the central and eastern tropical Pacific, decreased strength of the Pacific trade winds, and decreased rainfall in eastern and northern Australia.
Positive values SOIs are associated with strong Pacific trade winds and warming water temperatures in northern Australia, well known as a La Niña episode. Waters of central and eastern tropical parts The Pacific Ocean becomes colder during this time. Together this increases the likelihood of more rainfall than normal in eastern and northern Australia.
El Niño influence
As El Niño's warm waters fuel storms, it creates increased precipitation in the east-central and eastern Pacific Ocean.In South America, the El Niño effect is more pronounced than in North America. El Niño is associated with warm and very wet summer periods (December-February) along the coast of northern Peru and Ecuador, causing severe flooding whenever the event is severe. The effects during February, March, April may become critical. Southern Brazil and northern Argentina also experience wetter than normal conditions, but mainly during the spring and early summer. The central region of Chile gets a mild winter with big amount rains, and the Peruvian-Bolivian Plateau sometimes experiences winter snowfalls unusual for this region. Drier and warmer weather is observed in the Amazon Basin, Colombia and Central America.
Direct effects of El Niño leading to decreased humidity in Indonesia, increasing the likelihood of forest fires, in the Philippines and northern Australia. Also in June-August, dry weather is observed in the regions of Australia: Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales and eastern Tasmania.
The western Antarctic Peninsula, Ross Land, Bellingshausen and Amundsen seas are covered with large amounts of snow and ice during El Niño. The latter two and the Wedell Sea become warmer and are under higher atmospheric pressure.
In North America, winters are generally warmer than normal in the Midwest and Canada, while central and southern California, northwestern Mexico and the southeastern United States are getting wetter. The Pacific Northwest states, in other words, dry out during El Niño. Conversely, during La Niña, the US Midwest dries out. El Niño is also associated with decreased hurricane activity in the Atlantic.
East Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania and the White Nile Basin, experience long periods of rain from March to May. Droughts plague southern and central Africa from December to February, mainly Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Botswana.
Warm Pool of the Western Hemisphere. A study of climate data showed that approximately half of the post-El Niño summers experienced unusual warming in the Western Hemisphere Warm Pool. This influences the weather in the region and appears to have a connection to the North Atlantic Oscillation.
Atlantic effect. An El Niño-like effect is sometimes observed in the Atlantic Ocean, where water along the equatorial African coast becomes warmer and water off the coast of Brazil becomes colder. This can be attributed to the Volcker circulation over South America.
Non-climatic effects of El Niño
Along the east coast of South America, El Niño reduces the upwelling of cold, plankton-rich water that supports large populations of fish, which in turn support an abundance of seabirds, whose droppings support the fertilizer industry.Local fishing industries along coastlines may experience shortages of fish during prolonged El Niño events. The world's largest fisheries collapse due to overfishing, which occurred in 1972 during El Niño, led to a decline in the Peruvian anchovy population. During the events of 1982-83, populations of southern horse mackerel and anchovies declined. Although the number of shells in warm water increased, hake went deeper into cold water, and shrimp and sardines went south. But the catch of some other fish species was increased, for example, the common horse mackerel increased its population during warm events.
Changing locations and types of fish due to changing conditions have presented challenges for the fishing industry. The Peruvian sardine has moved towards the Chilean coast due to El Niño. Other conditions have only led to further complications, such as the Chilean government creating fishing restrictions in 1991.
It is postulated that El Niño led to the extinction of the Indian Mochico tribe and other tribes of the pre-Columbian Peruvian culture.
Causes that give rise to El Niño
The mechanisms that may cause El Niño events are still being researched. It is difficult to find patterns that can reveal causes or allow predictions to be made.Bjerknes suggested in 1969 that abnormal warming in the eastern Pacific Ocean could be attenuated by east-west temperature differences, causing weakening in the Volcker circulation and trade winds that move warm water westward. The result is an increase in warm water to the east.
Virtky in 1975 suggested that the trade winds could create a western bulge of warm waters, and any weakening of the winds could allow warm waters to move east. However, no bulges were noticed on the eve of the events of 1982-83.
Rechargeable Oscillator: Some mechanisms have been proposed that when warm areas are created in the equatorial region, they are dissipated to higher latitudes through El Niño events. The cooled areas are then recharged with heat for several years before the next event occurs.
Western Pacific Oscillator: In the western Pacific Ocean, several weather conditions could cause easterly wind anomalies. For example, a cyclone in the north and an anticyclone in the south result in an easterly wind between them. Such patterns can interact with the westerly flow across the Pacific Ocean and create a tendency for the flow to continue eastward. A weakening of the westerly current at this time may be the final trigger.
The equatorial Pacific Ocean can lead to El Niño-like conditions with a few random variations in behavior. External weather patterns or volcanic activity can be such factors.
The Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) is a critical source of variability that can contribute to sharper evolution leading to El Niño conditions, through fluctuations in low-level winds and precipitation over the western and central Pacific Ocean. The eastward propagation of oceanic Kelvin waves may be caused by MJO activity.
History of El Niño
The first mention of the term "El Niño" dates back to 1892, when Captain Camilo Carrilo reported at a congress Geographical Society in Lima that Peruvian sailors called the warm northerly current "El Niño" because it is most noticeable around Christmas. However, even then the phenomenon was interesting only because of its biological impact on the efficiency of the fertilizer industry.Normal conditions along the western Peruvian coast are a cold southerly current (Peruvian Current) with upwelling water; plankton upwelling leads to active ocean productivity; cold currents lead to a very dry climate on earth. Similar terms exist everywhere (California Current, Bengal Current). So replacing it with a warm northern current leads to a decrease in biological activity in the ocean and to torrential rains, leading to flooding, --- on the ground. The connection with flooding was reported in 1895 by Pezet and Eguiguren.
Towards the end of the nineteenth century there was increased interest in predicting climate anomalies (for food production) in India and Australia. Charles Todd suggested in 1893 that droughts in India and Australia occur at the same time. Norman Lockyer pointed out the same thing in 1904. In 1924, Gilbert Volcker first coined the term "Southern Oscillation."
For most of the twentieth century, El Niño was considered a large local phenomenon.
The Great El Niño of 1982-83 led to a sharp rise in the interest of the scientific community in this phenomenon.
History of the phenomenon
ENSO conditions have occurred every 2 to 7 years for at least the last 300 years, but most of them have been weak.
Major ENSO events occurred in 1790–93, 1828, 1876–78, 1891, 1925–26, 1982–83, and 1997–98.
Latest events El Niño occurred in 1986-1987, 1991-1992, 1993, 1994, 1997-1998 and 2002-2003.
The 1997–1998 El Niño in particular was strong and brought international attention to the phenomenon, while what was unusual about the 1990–1994 period was that El Niño occurred very frequently (but mostly weakly).
El Niño in the history of civilization
The mysterious disappearance of the Mayan civilization in Central America could be caused by severe climate changes. This conclusion was reached by a group of researchers from the German National Center for Geosciences, writes the British newspaper The Times.Scientists tried to establish why, at the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries AD, at opposite ends of the earth, the two largest civilizations of that time ceased to exist almost simultaneously. We are talking about the Mayan Indians and the fall of the Chinese Tang Dynasty, which was followed by a period of internecine strife.
Both civilizations were located in monsoon regions, the moisture of which depends on seasonal precipitation. However, at this time, apparently, the rainy season was not able to provide enough moisture for the development of agriculture.
The ensuing drought and subsequent famine led to the decline of these civilizations, researchers believe. They tie climate change With natural phenomenon"El Niño", which refers to temperature fluctuations in the surface waters of the eastern Pacific Ocean in tropical latitudes. This leads to large-scale disturbances in atmospheric circulation, causing droughts in traditionally wet regions and floods in dry ones.
Scientists came to these conclusions by studying the nature of sedimentary deposits in China and Mesoamerica dating back to this period. The last emperor of the Tang Dynasty died in 907 AD, and the last known Mayan calendar dates back to 903.
Phenomenon La Nina ("girl" in Spanish)) is characterized by an anomalous decrease in water surface temperature in the central and eastern part of the tropical Pacific Ocean. This process is the reverse of El Nino ("boy"), which, on the contrary, is associated with warming in the same zone. These states replace each other with a frequency of about a year.
Both El Niño and La Niña influence circulation patterns of ocean and atmospheric currents, which in turn influence weather and climate throughout to the globe, causing droughts in some regions, hurricanes and heavy rains- in others.
Following a period of neutrality in the El Niño-La Niña cycle observed in mid-2011, the tropical Pacific began to cool in August, with weak to moderate La Niña observed from October to date.
"Mathematical model forecasts and their expert interpretation indicate that La Niña is close to maximum strength and is likely to begin to slowly weaken in the coming months. However, current methods cannot forecast beyond May, so it is unclear what the situation will be will develop in the Pacific Ocean - whether it will be El Niño, La Niña or a neutral situation,” the report says.
Scientists note that La Niña 2011-2012 was significantly weaker than in 2010-2011. Models predict that temperatures in the Pacific Ocean will approach neutral levels between March and May 2012.
La Niña 2010 was accompanied by a decrease in cloud cover and increased trade winds. The decrease in pressure led to heavy rain in Australia, Indonesia and Southeast Asia. In addition, according to meteorologists, it is La Niña that is responsible for heavy rains in southern and drought in eastern equatorial Africa, as well as for the drought situation in central regions southwest Asia and South America.
El Niño(Spanish) El Niño— Baby, Boy) or Southern Oscillation(English) El Niño/La Niña - Southern Oscillation, ENSO ) is a fluctuation in the temperature of the surface layer of water in the equatorial part of the Pacific Ocean, which has a noticeable effect on the climate. In a narrower sense El Niño — phase of the Southern Oscillation, in which the area of heated surface waters shifts to the east. At the same time, trade winds weaken or stop altogether, and upwelling slows down in the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Peru. The opposite phase of oscillation is called La Niña(Spanish) La Nina— Baby, Girl). The characteristic oscillation time is from 3 to 8 years, but the strength and duration of El Niño in reality varies greatly. Thus, in 1790-1793, 1828, 1876-1878, 1891, 1925-1926, 1982-1983 and 1997-1998, powerful phases of El Niño were recorded, while, for example, in 1991-1992, 1993, 1994 this phenomenon , often repeating, was weakly expressed. El Niño 1997-1998 was so strong that it attracted the attention of the world community and the press. At the same time, theories about the connection of the Southern Oscillation with global climate change spread. Since the early 1980s, El Niño also occurred in 1986–1987 and 2002–2003.
Normal conditions along the western coast of Peru are determined by the cold Peruvian Current, carrying water from South. Where the current turns to the west, along the equator, cold and plankton-rich waters rise from deep depressions, which contributes to the active development of life in the ocean. The cold current itself determines the aridity of the climate in this part of Peru, forming deserts. Trade winds drive the heated surface layer of water into western zone tropical part of the Pacific Ocean, where the so-called tropical warm pool (TTB) is formed. In it, the water is heated to depths of 100-200 m. The Walker atmospheric circulation, manifested in the form of trade winds, coupled with low pressure over the Indonesian region, leads to the fact that in this place the level of the Pacific Ocean is 60 cm higher than in its eastern part . And the water temperature here reaches 29 - 30 °C versus 22 - 24 °C off the coast of Peru. However, everything changes with the onset of El Niño. The trade winds are weakening, the TTB is spreading, and water temperatures are rising across a vast area of the Pacific Ocean. In the region of Peru, the cold current is replaced by a warm water mass moving from the west to the coast of Peru, upwelling weakens, fish die without food, and westerly winds bring humid air masses and rainfall to the deserts, even causing floods. The onset of El Niño reduces the activity of Atlantic tropical cyclones.
The first mention of the term "El Niño" dates back to 1892, when Captain Camilo Carrilo reported at the Congress of the Geographical Society in Lima that Peruvian sailors called the warm northerly current "El Niño" because it was most noticeable around Christmas. In 1893, Charles Todd suggested that droughts in India and Australia were occurring at the same time. Norman Lockyer also pointed out the same thing in 1904. The connection between the warm northerly current off the coast of Peru and floods in that country was reported in 1895 by Peset and Eguiguren. The phenomena of the Southern Oscillation were first described in 1923 by Gilbert Thomas Walker. He introduced the terms Southern Oscillation, El Niño and La Niña, and examined the zonal convection circulation in the atmosphere in the equatorial zone of the Pacific Ocean, which now received his name. For a long time, almost no attention was paid to the phenomenon, considering it regional. Only towards the end of the 20th century. The connection between El Niño and the planet’s climate has been clarified.
El Niño 1997 (TOPEX)
Quantitative description
Currently, for a quantitative description of the phenomena, El Niño and La Niña are defined as temperature anomalies of the surface layer of the equatorial part of the Pacific Ocean lasting at least 5 months, expressed in a deviation of water temperature by 0.5 °C higher (El Niño) or lower (La Niña) side.
First signs of El Niño:
- Increase in air pressure over the Indian Ocean, Indonesia and Australia.
- A drop in pressure over Tahiti, over the central and eastern parts of the Pacific Ocean.
- Weakening of the trade winds in the South Pacific until they cease and the wind direction changes to the westerly.
- Warm air mass in Peru, rains in the Peruvian deserts.
In itself, an increase in water temperature off the coast of Peru by 0.5 °C is considered only a condition for the occurrence of El Niño. Typically, such an anomaly can exist for several weeks and then disappear safely. But only five-month anomaly classified as an El Niño event, can cause significant damage to the region’s economy due to a drop in fish catches.
Also used to describe El Niño Southern Oscillation Index(English) Southern Oscillation Index, SOI ). It is calculated as the difference in pressure over Tahiti and over Darwin (Australia). Negative values index indicate about the El Niño phase, and positive ones - about La Niña .
The influence of El Niño on the climate of various regions
In South America, the El Niño effect is most pronounced. This phenomenon usually causes warm and very humid summer periods(December to February) on the northern coast of Peru and Ecuador. When El Niño is strong, it causes severe flooding. This, for example, happened in January 2011. Southern Brazil and northern Argentina also experience wetter than usual periods, but mainly in the spring and early summer. Central Chile experiences mild winters with plenty of rain, while Peru and Bolivia occasionally experience unusual winter snowfalls for the region. Drier and warmer weather is observed in the Amazon, Colombia and Central America. Humidity is falling in Indonesia, increasing the likelihood of forest fires. This also applies to the Philippines and northern Australia. From June to August, dry weather occurs in Queensland, Victoria, New South Wales and eastern Tasmania. In Antarctica, the western Antarctic Peninsula, Ross Land, Bellingshausen and Amundsen seas are covered with large amounts of snow and ice. At the same time, the pressure increases and becomes warmer. In North America, winters generally become warmer in the Midwest and Canada. Central and southern California, northwestern Mexico and the southeastern United States are becoming wetter, while the Pacific Northwest states are becoming drier. During La Niña, on the other hand, the Midwest becomes drier. El Niño also leads to reduced Atlantic hurricane activity. Eastern Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania and the White Nile Basin, experiences long rainy seasons from March to May. Droughts plague southern and central Africa from December to February, mainly Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Botswana.
An El Niño-like effect is sometimes observed in the Atlantic Ocean, where water along the equatorial coast of Africa becomes warmer and water off the coast of Brazil becomes colder. Moreover, there is a connection between this circulation and El Niño.
Impact of El Niño on health and society
El Niño causes extreme weather associated with cycles in the incidence of epidemic diseases. El Niño is associated with an increased risk of mosquito-borne diseases: malaria, dengue fever, and Rift Valley fever. Malaria cycles are associated with El Niño in India, Venezuela and Colombia. There has been an association with outbreaks of Australian encephalitis (Murray Valley Encephalitis - MVE) occurring in south-eastern Australia following heavy rainfall and flooding caused by La Niña. A striking example is a severe outbreak of Rift Valley fever that occurred due to El Niño following extreme rainfall events in northeastern Kenya and southern Somalia in 1997-98.
It is also believed that El Niño may be associated with the cyclical nature of wars and the emergence of civil conflicts in countries whose climate is influenced by El Niño. A study of data from 1950 to 2004 found that El Niño was associated with 21% of all civil conflicts during that period. At the same time, the risk of civil war in El Niño years it is twice as high as in La Niña years. It is likely that the connection between climate and military action is mediated by crop failures, which often occur in hot years.
The La Niña phenomenon is an anomalous cooling of the surface in the central and eastern parts of the tropical Pacific Ocean in winter. As Japanese meteorologists reported, the lowest temperatures were recorded in mid-February, but by early March the indicators had returned to normal levels. According to weather forecasters, this is a sign of the imminent final approach to the fall - at least in Japan, located in the Pacific Ocean. Experts are currently studying the possibility of an opposite phenomenon, El Niño, occurring in the coming summer, which is characterized by an anomalous increase in water temperatures in the Pacific Ocean.
La Niña typically results in heavy rainfall and tropical storms on the west coast of South America, south-east Asia and eastern equatorial Africa. Nevertheless, this phenomenon can influence the weather on a global scale. In particular, this winter the phenomenon became one of the factors that led to severe cold in Europe, ITAR-TASS reports.
http://news.rambler.ru/13104180/33618609/
The climate phenomenon La Niña, associated with a drop in water temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean and influencing weather patterns across almost the entire globe, has disappeared and is not likely to return until the end of 2012, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) said.
The La Nina phenomenon (La Nina, "the girl" in Spanish) is characterized by an anomalous decrease in surface water temperature in the central and eastern part of the tropical Pacific Ocean. This process is the opposite of El Niño (El Nino, “the boy”), which, on the contrary, is associated with warming in the same zone. These states replace each other with a frequency of about a year.
Following a period of neutrality in the El Niño–La Niña cycle observed in mid-2011, the tropical Pacific began to cool in August and has experienced weak to moderate La Niña from October to date. By early April, La Niña had completely disappeared, and neutral conditions are still observed in the equatorial Pacific, experts write.
“(Analysis of modeling results) suggests that La Niña is unlikely to return this year, while the probabilities of remaining neutral and El Niño occurring in the second half of the year are approximately equal,” the WMO said.
Both El Niño and La Niña influence circulation patterns of ocean and atmospheric currents, which in turn influence weather and climate across the globe, causing droughts in some regions and hurricanes and heavy rainfall in others.
Message from 05/17/2012
The La Niña climate phenomenon that occurred in 2011 was so strong that it ultimately caused global sea levels to drop by as much as 5 mm. La Niña brought a shift in Pacific surface temperatures and changed precipitation patterns around the world as earth moisture began to leave the ocean and head to land in the form of rains in Australia, northern South America, and Southeast Asia.
The alternating dominance of the warm oceanic phase of the Southern Oscillation, El Niño, and the cold phase, La Niña, can change global sea levels so dramatically, but satellite data inexorably indicates that global levels have The waters still rise to a height of about 3 mm.
As soon as El Niño arrives, the rise in water levels begins to occur faster, but with a change in phases almost every five years, a diametrically opposite phenomenon is observed. The strength of the effect of a particular phase also depends on other factors and clearly reflects the general climate change towards its harshness. Many scientists around the world are studying both phases of the southern oscillation, as they contain many clues to what is happening on Earth and what awaits it.
A moderate to strong La Niña atmospheric phenomenon will continue in the tropical Pacific until April 2011. This is according to an El Niño/La Niña advisory issued on Monday by the World Meteorological Organization.
As the document highlights, all model-based forecasts predict a continuation or possible intensification of the La Niña phenomenon over the next 4-6 months, ITAR-TASS reports.
For La Niña, which this year formed in June-July, replacing the one that ended in April El Niño phenomenon, characterized by unusually low water temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial parts of the Pacific Ocean. This disrupts normal tropical precipitation and atmospheric circulation patterns. El Niño is exactly the opposite phenomenon, which is characterized by unusual high temperatures waters in the Pacific Ocean.
The effects of these phenomena can be felt in many parts of the planet, expressed in floods, storms, droughts, increases or, conversely, decreases in temperatures. Typically, La Niña results in heavy winter rainfall in the eastern equatorial Pacific, Indonesia, and the Philippines, and severe droughts in Ecuador, northwestern Peru, and eastern equatorial Africa.
La Niña, which may increase in intensity and continue until the end of this year or the beginning of next year.
In the latest report in the Ministry of Defense on El Niño phenomena and La Niña, it is said that the current La Niña phenomenon will peak at the end of this year, but the intensity will be less than it was in the second half of 2010. Due to its uncertainty, the MoD invites the countries of the Pacific Ocean basin to closely monitor its development and promptly report possible droughts and floods due to it.
The La Niña phenomenon refers to the phenomenon of an anomalous long-term large-scale cooling of the waters in the eastern and central parts of the Pacific Ocean near the equator, which gives rise to a global climate anomaly. The previous La Niña event resulted in spring drought along the western Pacific coast, including China.
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