METEOROLOGISTS say this year’s El Niño—the regular warming of the eastern Pacific Ocean that impacts worldwide weather—is proving to be different. The Climate Prediction Center of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently described it as “significant and strengthening.”
Some experts predict that it will be more severe than its 1997-1998 predecessor, currently the strongest in recorded history.
And it could also last longer, spanning the second back-to-back years of a rare “double El Niño” that started in December 2014.
No two El Niño play out in exactly the same way. Yet, their effects— uncharacteristic dry spells in Southeast Asia and Australia, erratic tropical cyclones in East Asia, wetter weather in the west coast of South and Central America, and warmer winters in Pacific North America—are still more or less predictable and equally devastating.
Water in Angat Dam has dipped below safe levels on account of less rainfall, prompting water utilities to implement service interruptions and warn of looming shortages last month. Some estimate that up to 1 million agricultural workers could lose their jobs due to El Niño this year.
Dry spells in Indonesia have exacerbated the haze caused by forest fires, forcing Singapore and Malaysia to shut down schools, ground airplanes and declare states of emergency. Last Thursday heavy rains caused a massive landslide that buried part of Santa Catarina Pinula in Guatemala. Hundreds remain missing.
El Niño seems to have triggered unprecedented rainfall on Atlantic coastlines. Hurricane Joaquin is becoming among the strongest storms on record to hit the Caribbean, dumping up to 20 inches of rain on South Carolina—nearly four months of rainfall for the state in a single day.
El Niño is now wrecking havoc on two oceans. A 2014 paper by the Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory under the NOAA found that, across 20 climate-forecasting models, the frequency of intense El Niño will double in the 21st century, with the likelihood of extreme events occurring roughly once every 10 years instead of once every 20.
And it’s supposed to do its mischief only in December.
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