Climate scientists: Effects of El Niño could produce more winter storms this season
Scientists say El Niño is a natural climate pattern that typically comes every two to seven years, which brings warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures to the equatorial Pacific Ocean.
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Climate scientists say that the effects of El Niño have the potential to impact this winter’s weather expectations.
Scientists say it is a natural climate pattern that typically comes every two to seven years, which brings warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures to the equatorial Pacific Ocean.
“The effects of El Niño are pretty pronounced across a lot of the continent, and really, a lot of the world,” says UCLA scientist Dr. Daniel Swain.
Swain says that El Niño typically leads to warmer and drier conditions in northern sections of the United States, with cooler and wetter weather across southern stretches of the U.S.
Scientists say that El Niño will likely mean more winter storms this January through March.
Swain says that the abnormally warm weather across the rest of the world’s oceans could change how El Niño impacts the U.S.
“The global oceans outside of the El Niño zone in the tropics are also extremely warm. And so that combination is something we haven't seen before,” he says.
