Table of Contents
What happens during an El Niño event of California?
During an El Niño event, the surface waters in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean become significantly warmer than usual. That change is intimately tied to the atmosphere and to the winds blowing over the vast Pacific. This allows great masses of warm water to slosh from the western Pacific toward the Americas.
How do El Niño and La Niña affect California?
Everyone across California may experience La Niña weather conditions this winter. During El Niño, winds are weaker and warm water moves towards the West Coast, whereas with La Niña, which means “little girl” in Spanish, trade winds are typically stronger.
What weather changes occur in California during an El Niño year?
The storm patterns associated with El Nino result in anomalously wet weather with increased flood frequencies across the Southwest U.S. and anomalously dry weather across the Northwest. In California, the southern part of the state (e.g. south of Pt. Concepcion) exhibits the strongest link to the El Nino phenomenon.
What is climate condition occurs during El Nino?
Around the world, depending on the location, some of the conditions associated with El Niño include: hot weather and droughts; forest and bush wildfires; heavy rain and subsequent flooding; tropical cyclone activity; typhoons and landslides.
What is El Nino weather patterns associated with?
An El Niño is associated with warm and very wet weather months in April-October along the coasts of northern Peru and Ecuador, causing major flooding whenever the event is strong or extreme. La Niña causes a drop in sea surface temperatures over Southeast Asia and heavy rains over Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia.
How does El Nino affect upwelling?
During El Niño, upwelling of cooler oceanic water decreases along the S. American coast. What typically happens is that the trade winds move from S. America to Asia/Australia, and warm surface water is dragged away from the coast and colder, nutrient water rises to shallow depths.
How would El Nino affect the water cycle?
In El Niño conditions, the winds propelling the water get weaker and as an outcome, some of the warm water collected in the west is heavily drawn towards the east. At the same time, not so much cold water is pulled up from beneath. Accordingly, these elements make the water in the pacific warmer which results in El Niño events.