El Nino weather pattern forms in Pacific

[WhiteTara]

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyID=2006-09-13T160639Z_01_N13416906_RTRUKOC_0_US-WEATHER-NINO.xml&archived=False

NEW YORK (Reuters) - El Nino, an extreme warming of equatorial waters in the Pacific Ocean that wreaks havoc with world weather conditions, has formed and will last into 2007, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said on Wednesday.

The El Nino has already helped make the Atlantic hurricane season milder than expected, said a forecaster for the NOAA.

"The weak El Nino is helping to explain why the hurricane season is less than we expected. El Ninos tend to suppress hurricane activity in the Atlantic," said Gerry Bell, a hurricane forecaster for NOAA.

The NOAA's Climate Prediction Center (CPC) said the El Nino probably will spur warmer-than-average temperatures this winter over western and central Canada and the western and northern United States.

It said El Nino also will cause wetter-than-average conditions in the U.S. Gulf Coast and Florida, and spark dry conditions in the Ohio valley, the Pacific Northwest and most U.S. islands in the tropical Pacific.

more

[msongs]

1. maybe we will have more rain in CA and the southwest nt

[brook]

7. I hope so.

My water bills are 60 bucks a month and they're hiking it about 20% next month! I'm thinking of getting some rain barrels.

[Bandit]

20. If only I could send you some of ours

We have had the coldest wettest summer in history. In August it rained 29 out of 31 days. If there were anyway possible to trade some rain for some sun I would gladly do it..:shrug: We have been told that our wet weather is do to La Nina, El Nino's little sister..

[Megahurtz]

8. I would love to have more rain in CA

and storms, and puffy white clouds.

[Monkeyman]

2. Crap wet snow now

[maxsolomon]

3. ah, crap

bad ski season in the NW

[xchrom]

4. oh happy happy joy joy

like traffic here isn't bad already -- i remember driving the freeways in the last el ninio.

[RamboLiberal]

5. Last El Nino we had a warm nearly snowless winter in NE

I could root for that to get a break from home heating oil prices!

[dflprincess]

10. The local weather man says it could mean a warmer, dryer

winter for Minnesota as well. Assuming, it follows the course of other El Nino winters. That's okay by me.

[pitohui]

6. WHOO HOO!

how many lives this will save, we'll never know, two days ago the headline story in the new orleans times-picayune newspaper was how the pumps don't work and the levees ain't fixed

el nino won't last forever but it buys time and in this case the time it buys will also buy lives

the 2006 gulf of mexico tropical cyclone season is OVAH!

[Gman]

9. By the end of July I was wondering if an El Nino was forming

the weather's behavior with the lack of tropical storms was very indicative of an El Nino.

It could also mean the end of the drought here in S Texas.

[Canadian_moderate]

11. We can use a nice mild winter again

here in Toronto. It's been much cooler than usual since about mid-August.

[WhiteTara]

12. the downside is that beetles love it too and the

forests are being eaten alive by these things because the winters don't kill them anymore.

[pitohui]

16. well way to pull defeat from the jaws of victory

guess what when the storms hit and weaken the trees the beetles kills them ANYWAY, we are seeing a massive beetle infection post-katrina

at least this way you don't have 2,000 people killed and 300,000 houses destroyed know what i mean?

el nino coming this fall unexpectedly is a gift in my view

[laundry_queen]

19. Yes that is a huge problem where I live.

A place that was previously thought to be too far north for the pine beetles. Another warm winter won't help. *sigh*
Edited for dumb spelling error.

[lovuian]

13. Warmer Pacific it makes one wonder if the Atlantic is getting

cooler due to less salinity of the Atlantic Ocean is the conveyor belt slowing down...

[Psephos]

17. There is no connection.

El Nino is a cycle of warming/cooling in the Pacific Basin every four to seven years. There have been El Ninos for uncounted thousands of years. Basically, warm water sloshes from West to East, and rams into South America. The thermal energy of this huge warm mass of water creates big updrafts of moisture near South America, while the cooler water near Indonesia brings less weather (i.e., less rain) in the West. Then, after a while, the warm water sloshes back West, and we have a La Nina, with colder than normal water near South America.

El Nino's confined to the Pacific basin, without coupling to the Atlantic basin. It can, however, affect atmospheric conditions somewhat in the Atlantic. It's now thought that El Nino has caused wind shearing at high altitudes over the tropical Atlantic this year, scattering the top layers of Atlantic tropical depressions, which has prevented them from organizing into hurricanes. That's why we're having a light hurricane season.

Peace.

[frylock]

14. i am el niño ..

[VTMechEngr]

15. Oh Happy Day in New England!

U.S. NORTHEAST IN FOR MILDER WINTER

An El Nino also usually leads to milder winter weather in the U.S. northeast, the top heating oil market in the world. :headbang:

[ecoalex]

18. Sacramento better watch out !

Wowee 3rd wet winter for Central Ca.After so many years of drought.The lakes are high still, this will top them off.Sacramento better watch out, El Nino brings flooding usually. The levees are in poor shape, Sacramento next to New Orleans is the most easist flooded city in the U.S.Let's hope the boy takes it easy on California.

[robertarctor]

22. Oh, great

I work in South Natomas, a block from the river.

[Javaman]

21. I remember the famous winter of 11 storms in L.A.

this was, If I remember correctly, the winter of 1991. Eleven successive storms hit southern california due to el nino. Mud slides galore. But the biggest deal was when Balboa park flooded. Anyone that lives out there will remember watching the news when the 101 was closed in that area due to flooding...101 at that point is 36 feet above the road way.

It was unreal. I remember getting a call at 2 am one morning from my boss. The production company I worked for at the time, sat at the base of the Santa Monica Mountains. It was raining cats and dogs, for the next 6 hours me and about 15 other production assistants, producers and directors (hard to believe, I know) sand bagged the building against a mud slide of epic proportions. We were exhausted.

When we felt we stemmed the tide, we all slept on the stage.

We awoke about 4 hour later to an emergency. One of the sand bagged walls breached. tired and filthy, we pitched in and plugged the leak. Now in the light of day, we could see the damage the mudslides had done to the neighborhood.

Between us and the mountain "had" been several apartment buildings. Mud was flowing freely through the first floors like a river.

We got a few days of sun after that and began the long process of shoveling everything out.

I will never ever forget that time.

[Xithras]

23. Let's dispel a myth about El Nino and California.

El Nino is NOT a guarantee of more rainfall in California. WEAK El Nino effects have brought drought to this state in the past (the deepest drought in California history, in 1976, occurred during a weak El Nino...it caused water rationing, massive water price spikes, and "let it die" orders for both farmers and lawn owners). Strong El Nino events, on the other hand, have brought double normal rainfall and flooding during four of the last six appearances. El Nino's are NEVER good for California.

The article says that the current El Nino is weak, and that it's development into a strong one is only a possibility. At the moment, we're facing what will probably be a dry winter. Besides, we got enough rain LAST winter from a NORMAL weather cycle that I really don't want to see any increase. During the 1997 flood events in Northern California, the broken levees and massive flooding were somewhat moderated by the fact that it was mostly empty farmland being inundated. Much of that same land has seen extensive development over the past decade, and those same floods today would destroy thousands of homes and kill many people.

[kineneb]

25. yup, 41 inches of rain was quite enough

that is what most of Lake Co. CA got last year...

the CalTrans folks are my heros- they kept Hwy 20 open during that horrid rainstorm around New Year's day, when the hillsides wanted to fall down and meet the lake...one guy was up to his waist in a drain, clearing it so the road wouldn't flood, all the while it is pouring rain... I have to bake them a batch of cookies sometime, and walk over to their station.

[demo dutch]

24. More bad news for the thawing permafrost and melting polar ice caps