Thursday, May 8, 2014
El Nino on the Horizon
I don't want to be unnecessarily alarmist, but it does appear as though another El Nino event is looming in South Eastern Australia. According to the Bureau of Meteorology, there is a current warming trend across the tropical Pacific Ocean.
If the warmer conditions persist over the Tropical Pacific, this can interrupt the trade winds around the equator, resulting in cloud build up, and a change in ocean temperatures.
The El Nino occurs when there are differences between the Ocean Temperature in the
Western Pacific around Australia, and the Eastern Pacific around South America. This difference causes a change in weather patterns, with higher rainfall in the East, and lower in the West. Past El Ninos have been associated with droughts in Australia.
At the moment, the BOM is saying that an El Nino could develop as early as July, with warnings at an alert level. WHilst it is early days in the modelling, watch the Bureau at http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/ as the conditions develop.
I would suggest to farmers and growers in South Eastern Australia, start planning for dry conditions, and plant your crops early to take advantage of Autumn soil moisture.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
an update on this developing situation: the El Nino alert is still current, according to the Bureau of Meteorology latest report on 20 May. Sydney (and most of South Eastern Australia) has been experiencing abnormally high autumn daytime temperatures which have been sustained over the last 2 weeks. I'm not a big gambler, but the odds are at least 70% of El Nino developing by August. That's fairly short odds, and probably conservative too.
ReplyDeletewell, it's now November, and we are well and truly into a dry spell..hardly any rain for ages (just a couple of light showers)..hot and dry. Yesterday a very warm and sunny 36degrees. We are not officially in an El Nino, but certainly we could be in the beginning of another drought. Watch this space!!!
ReplyDelete