# Super El Niño meets climate change

> A record-breaking El Niño is colliding with a warming world, and scientists are racing to understand what that means.
- Title: Super El Niño meets climate change · WIRED | Shortify
- Summary: A record-breaking El Niño is colliding with a warming world, and scientists are racing to understand what that means. A super El Niño forecast to reach…
- Keywords: el niño, climate change, tropical pacific, noaa, global warming, weather patterns, climate research, Super, Niño, meets, climate, change
- Source: WIRED — https://wired.com/story/super-el-nino-climate-change-connections
- Author: Fernanda González
- Published: 2026-10-11T09:30:00+00:00
- Read time: 1 min
- Topics: el niño, climate change, tropical pacific, noaa, global warming, weather patterns, climate research
## 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.
## Key takeaway

A super El Niño forecast to reach unprecedented strength this winter is interacting with climate change in ways researchers are still studying, with potential for extreme global impacts.