Thursday, September 10, 2009

NOAA sees El Nino strengthening through 2009

Reuters: The U.S. Climate Prediction Center said Thursday the El Nino weather anomaly should strengthen this fall and through the 2009/10 northern hemisphere winter. "A majority of the model forecasts ... suggest El Nino will reach at least moderate strength during the northern hemisphere fall," it stated in its monthly update.

The CPC is the chief office in the U.S. National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration tracking El Nino. El Nino, 'little boy' in Spanish, is an abnormal warming of waters in the equatorial Pacific Ocean which can wreak havoc on weather patterns across the Asia-Pacific region and beyond.

It was named after the Christ child when it was first observed around Christmas by anchovy fishermen in Latin America in the 19th century. Despite its current weak state, El Nino has apparently affected the annual Atlantic hurricane season. The weather pattern normally allows wind shear to disrupt storm formation in the Atlantic basin and help drive storms away from land….

An eight ball shot by Samer Abdallah from Doha, Qatar, Wikimedia Commons, under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 License.

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