Heat builds in the Pacific

The tropical Pacific has seen heat build for months as a super El Niño takes shape. This year's iteration is forecast to reach unprecedented strength this winter.

What is El Niño doing?

El Niño is characterized by hotter-than-normal waters in the eastern tropical Pacific. It affects the atmosphere, causing weather patterns around the world to shift like a domino run.

Record heat already set

The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasts one hundred percent odds of an extremely strong El Niño through December.

Could break the 1982 record

NOAA predicts heat could peak at two point seven degrees Celsius above normal from October to December.

Climate change is a factor

Francisco Estrada, coordinator of the Climate Change Research Program at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, says the magnitude and frequency of El Niño has increased over the past sixty years.

“You can't separate El Niño from global warming, they're inextricably linked.”

Models show El Niño strengthening

Christopher Callahan, a climate researcher at Indiana University, says the majority of climate models say El Niño amplitude shall go up in a warming climate.

Unprecedented impacts feared

Callahan notes that even if climate change has not made El Niño itself stronger, the presence of those sea surface temperatures in a climate changed by global warming might produce unprecedented impacts.

“Surprises are the last thing you want when you're trying to manage risk.”

Trillions at stake

Callahan's work shows that the impacts of El Niño on society are extreme, with the most severe events knocking off trillions of dollars from the global GDP.

UN calls for urgent action

The United Nations and other international organizations have called for urgent adaptation measures to safeguard at-risk populations and ecosystems.

“El Niño conditions will pour fuel on the fire of a warming world. Impacts will hit even harder, travel even farther, and cross borders with devastating speed.”