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.
herkimer says: “Also why only compare the potential current situation with a very strong El Ninos…”
Because people are comparing this year to the 1997/98 El Nino. The next post will compare the evolution of this El Nino to the other ones. I didn’t have the time this morning to graph all the other ones during the satellite era.
Cheers
You can get the Pacific equatorial cross-sections on a monthly basis back to 1979 here.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/GODAS/mnth_gif/xz/
This is what it looked like in May 1997
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/GODAS/mnth_gif/xz/mnth.anom.xz.temp.0n.1997.05.gif
Compared to right now which is pretty close in my opinion.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/GODAS/pent_gif/xz/pent.anom.xz.temp.0n.1.gif
The surface temps in May 1997 were actually quite a bit cooler than they are right now although the second biggest Super-El Nino in history was lurking right below the surface, and would peak just 7 months after this surface temp map.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/GODAS/mnth_gif/xy/mnth.anom.xy.oisst.2007.05.gif
It almost seems to me that an El Nino event, is a way the heat from the ocean is belched into the atmosphere on the way back to Space. The heated ocean water cools, giving up the heat to the atmosphere, the atmosphere can’t hold the heat for more than a year or so, as its GHG blanket is woven with the comparable material as women’s fishnet stockings, Ceres and Erbe confirm the heat gets out; and then the result is both the Oceans and Atmosphere cool.
All in all, a negative energy feedback.
It seems to me the standard view of El Niño is becoming questionable. It appears the warm water beneath the surface is driven eastward by a Kelvin wave and this is what initiates the process. This warm water then surfaces which changes the pressure difference between the East/Central and West Pacific. The trade winds then slacken due to the change in pressure.
If this is indeed the case, what is it that drives these warm waves? This would be the cause of the El Niño.
Tom Andersen says: @ur momisugly April 14, 2014 at 9:04 am
Off topic, sorry about that, Reddit AMA from Stephen Lewandowsky….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
This comment is a real corker!
So we should take Lewandowsky at his word and he should be willing to give his raw data to statisticians like Steve M or W. Briggs, right, RIGHT?
( I want to capture that before my computer goes down – bad thunderstorm.)
……
Bob, I really did not want to hear we are getting an El Niño just in time for mid-term elections. (I rather have a Polar Vortex) Hopefully it is weak and peaks quickly.
I dunno, but the SOI is just now backing up a tad, I’m not feeling much of an El Nino. Looks more like a brief departure from an extended regime of Neutral conditions.
Estragon:
Nothing to be done.
Damn – cant you help me get this shoe off!
Vladimir:
Never mind your shoe – el Ninot is really coming this time.
Estragon:
Today?
Vladimir:
Yes – or if not, then tomorrow certainly.
Just as soon as those trades stop blowing and allow the Kelvin wave to surface.
Estragon:
And those trades will die down any day now, wont they?
Vladimir:
Any day now.
Richard M says: “If this is indeed the case, what is it that drives these warm waves? This would be the cause of the El Niño.”
Westerly wind bursts:
http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2013/10/22/enso-basics-westerly-wind-bursts-initiate-an-el-nino/
Of course, there has to be enough warm water in the western tropical Pacific to support the Kelvin wave and, later, the El Nino.
Regards
Bob T … from what I can see the warm water moves below the surface even while the trade winds are easterly. Maybe a temporary lull gets the process going? Still a little unclear to me.
AGW activists have long stated that warming in the last three decades of the century cannot be explained by solar activity, as the peak was earlier in the century. I’ve thought that the ‘pan of water on the stove’ analogy perhaps applies, i.e. that the water continues to warm up or stay warm even though the stove has been turned down from maximum a little, but this in itself is hardly evidence.
You’ve suggested through your analyses of SST that latter 20C warming occurred in a few steps, triggered by Nino events. My questions are: could these significant Nino events be considered to be a lagged response to the strong solar activity seen from 1950 onwards? If so, would you or anyone else have a handle on how big a factor this could be?
How about the odds of an El Nada or La Nina? Still in the 50:50 range? Which means nobody knows nothin’?