Comparisons are still being made of the 1997/98 El Niño with the El Niño forming this year. So I thought we should compare the weekly sea surface temperature anomalies for this year, in two NINO regions, with those during 1997 for the 1997/98 El Niño and 1982 for the 1982/83 El Niño. The 1982/83 and 1997/98 El Niño events were the two strongest single-season events of the late 20th Century. (The 1986/87/88 El Niño wasn’t as strong as the 1982/83 El Niño in terms of peak sea surface temperature anomalies, but the 1986/87/88 event remained an El Niño for more than one year, so it was likely comparable to the 1982/83 El Niño if duration is taken into account.)
First, the NINO3.4 region, see Figure 1. The NINO3.4 region is bordered by the coordinates of 5S-5N, 170W-120W. See the illustration here for the location. It captures the sea surface temperature anomalies of the east-central equatorial Pacific. Sea surface temperature anomalies of the NINO3.4 region are a commonly used index for the strength, timing and duration of El Niño and La Niña events. And as you can see, the weekly NINO3.4 sea surface temperature anomalies still have not reached the +0.5 deg C threshold of El Niño conditions. It’s still a little early. They are presently at +0.31 Deg C compared to the reference years of 1971-2000.
Figure 1
Sea surface temperature anomalies in the NINO3.4 region are evolving about the same as they did for the 1982/83 and 1997/98 El Niños.
– HOWEVER –
Sea surface temperature anomalies of the NINO3.4 region really don’t do justice to the 1997/98 El Niño. That El Niño was freakish in how quickly it evolved in the eastern (not central) equatorial Pacific and how warm the sea surface temperatures eventually grew there. We can use the sea surface temperature anomalies of the NINO1+2 region to illustrate this. See Figure 2. The NINO1+2 region is bordered by the coordinates of 10S-0, 90W-80W. It’s just west and south of the Galapagos Islands.
Figure 2
The sea surface temperature anomalies in the eastern equatorial Pacific are evolving this year more like the 1982/83 El Niño. The NINO1+2 data for 1997 shows east Pacific sea surface temperatures warmed much sooner during the 1997/98 El Niño.
The 1982/83 El Niño was strong, there’s no doubt about that, but it was nowhere close to being comparable to the 1997/98 El Niño as an east Pacific event.
A couple of things to keep in mind: First, there are subtle differences between El Niño events. It’s still very early in the evolution this year to make predictions of how strong the 2014/15 El Niño will eventually become.
Second, before you look at global surface temperature data and conclude that the 1982/83 El Niño had a very small effect on global surface temperatures, compared to the 1997/98 El Niño, keep in mind that the 1982/83 El Niño was counteracted by the eruption of El Chichon that year and there was no colossal explosive volcano in 1997 to offset the 1997/98 El Nino.
EARLIER POSTS IN THIS SERIES
- The 2014/15 El Niño – Part 1 – The Initial Processes of the El Niño.
- The 2014/15 El Niño – Part 2 – The Alarmist Misinformation (BS) Begins
FURTHER READING
My ebook Who Turned on the Heat? goes into much more detail to explain El Niño and La Niña processes and the long-term aftereffects of strong El Niño events. I’ve lowered the price of Who Turned on the Heat? from U.S.$8.00 to U.S.$5.00…with hope of increasing sales a little bit. A free preview in pdf format is here. The preview includes the Table of Contents, the Introduction, the first half of section 1 (which was provided complete in the post here), a discussion of the cover, and the Closing. Take a run through the Table of Contents. It is a very-detailed and well-illustrated book—using data from the real world, not models of a virtual world. Who Turned on the Heat? is only available in pdf format…and will only be available in that format. Click here to purchase a copy. Thanks.
Oops, I forgot to include the data source:
The Sea Surface Temperature anomaly data used in this post is available through the NOAA NOMADS website:
http://nomad1.ncep.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/pdisp_sst.sh
or:
http://nomad3.ncep.noaa.gov/cgi-bin/pdisp_sst.sh?lite=
Perhaps you can also include a graph on number of “the sky is falling” articles on the three El Nino events.
Seriously, thanks for just posting the facts and letting us figure it out. You and the other authors here are the best.
Hey Bob, there has been excitement over the past couple of years about an El Nino forming, is this years trend so far any stronger evidence than previous?
Bob, you write ” with the El Niño forming this year.”
So you are predicting that, without any doubt at all, there will be an El Nino this year. I know virtually nothing about the subject, but I still have doubts that an El Nino will, in fact, form in 2014.
Since the Eastern Pacific sits on the “ring of fire” has anyone ever made a study of subsurface volcanoes and El Nino formation. IMHO the only thing that would cause an “early” temperature development would be SSV activity.
13April: The Economist Blog: Babbage: Rebels without a cause?
A study published online today for Nature Climate Change, led by Philip Munday from James Cook University in Australia, suggests that elevated levels of carbon dioxide in seawater affect the behaviour of young damselfish and cardinalfish in a manner that may ultimately, in natural ecosystems, harm larger marine communities. Juveniles living in more acidic environments appeared oblivious to the dangers therein, acting more rashly than fish from less acidic areas as a result…
Dr Munday and his team therefore studied three sites off Papua New Guinea to test the effects of continuous carbon dioxide exposure on reef fish behaviour…
First a tank was prepared containing a two-channel choice flume filled with water streams either conditioned with or without odour from predatory fish. Then the team captured ten individuals from each of the species under consideration and monitored which stream they would prefer to swim in over four minutes…
Results across the species were similar. But they differed when fish from more acidic waters were compared with those from control communities. Fish used to higher levels of carbon dioxide spent 90% of their time in water perfumed with predators; control fish spent all their time in the other stream…
The rash behaviour of fish accustomed to higher acidity did not stop there, however. After being placed individually within another tank that contained a small coral colony for shelter, the scaly participants were left for two hours (so they could get used to their new surroundings). Their activity, and the distance they travelled from the coral, were then observed for five minutes after which the fish were “chased” back home with the help of a pencil. Scary stuff…
The implications of the study are more troubling than even pencils acting aggressively.
http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2014/04/ocean-acidification
weak to moderate el niño is most likely but not super extra mega el niño
Region 1+2 is small compared to the other regions. How important is it?
Bob,
Excellent article as always. I do have a question that others have asked as well: why are you convinced that an El Nino is actually forming at this early point?
Bob….Thanks for the info.
Since it looks like there will be an El Nino, as predicted…I’m curious if there have been any predictions about a Nina forming.
Bob, since you and other specialists are expecting an El Niño, I accept that one is likely. However, I have been watching global wind patterns here–http://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-146.90,-0.83,289–and continue to see the trade winds as predominately easterly. In your essays on El Niño you repeatedly cite a weakening of the trade winds as one of the conditions for an El Niño. Are the current trades much weaker than normal, or are there additional conditions that can lead to an El Niño? I believe you have said that a considerable quantity of warm water has already moved eastward from the Pacific Warm Pool. Any clarification would be greatly appreciated.
I took the hint and just bought Bob’s book. I see it is 550+ pages, so I know where my spare time it going for the next week or so! But I have often wished I better understood the subject, so I look forward to the education.
The 98 super El Nino followed on the heels of a record “Haze” in SE Asia, largely a result of seasonal land clearing and local wind patterns. Coincidence?
Thanks Bob, I appreciate your staying on top of this issue and making it plain for us to see
I’d bet my house we don’t get a super el nino. (hey, it’s a small house). Actually, I’d prefer a 97-98 variety. Weak el nino in context of cold pdo spells another nasty winter for U.S.. Also, not worried about wrecking the pause if we do get a major el nino. It might break the trend for a year or two, but the alarmists who to a man are salivating to be proven right that we’re all going to fry, forget what happens after a spike up…which is a spike down.
Thanks Bob, for the update
Q, Do you feel Recent Solar TSI spike since Oct had anything to do with the Spike in the PDO. PDO seemed to move closely with TSI over last 15 months.
I charted TSI and PDO over the last 15 months.
https://mobile.twitter.com/NJSnowFan/status/455309493740371968/photo/1
Lord Beaverbrook says: “Hey Bob, there has been excitement over the past couple of years about an El Nino forming, is this years trend so far any stronger evidence than previous?”
This year is not unusual for a strong El Nino. I’ll compare this one to the lesser El Ninos later in the week.
I am sure the warmist alarmists are ringing their hands hoping for a super El Nino to come in 2014-15 to break the 17-year pause, which is really not a pause at all, even though it needs some breaking. Their inner thoughts would praise mother nature for coming through for them, but their lips will will parrot something quite different.
Jim Cripwell says: “So you are predicting that, without any doubt at all, there will be an El Nino this year.”
And:
hunter says: “why are you convinced that an El Nino is actually forming at this early point?”
In response to the downwelling Kelvin wave, there is a chunk (<– scientific word) of warmer-than-normal water beneath the surface of the eastern equatorial Pacific:
http://bobtisdale.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/animation-2-godas-equatorial-cross-section.gif
It will either be drawn to the surface, which is what appears to be happening, or it will be recirculated. It’s not going to disappear.
njsnowfan, sorry. I don’t really study the PDO for 2 reasons. (1) The PDO is not sea surface temperature data (it’s derived from sea surface temperature data) and (2) the PDO is an aftereffect of ENSO.
Regards
I also put this together ENSO and solar. From the looks of things with past El Ninos and solar this time solar in not strong enough to make a supper El Nino this time.
https://mobile.twitter.com/NJSnowFan/status/454552560091680768/photo/1
Truth Disciple says: “Since the Eastern Pacific sits on the “ring of fire” has anyone ever made a study of subsurface volcanoes and El Nino formation.”
I’ve seen discussions of it, but I’ve never seen anything worthwhile, because the warm water for the El Nino comes from the western tropical Pacific, not the eastern.
commieBob says: “Region 1+2 is small compared to the other regions. How important is it?”
Like the NINO3.4 region, the NINO1+2 region provides us an indication of the strength of an El Nino, but on a different portion of the equatorial Pacific. The 1997/98 El Nino was especially strong in both the central and eastern portions of the equatorial Pacific.
Dave Day says: “I took the hint and just bought Bob’s book.”
Thanks. Enjoy.
Bob of I get time tonight I will put TSI and ENSO chart. Just curious if there is a match with Solar TSI spikes.
Thanks for the response.