Recent studies have investigated whether both the amplitude and key characteristics of El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events have been changing, potentially due to some natural and/or anthropogenic change in the tropical Pacific Ocean state during recent decades (e.g., Yeh et al. 2009; Lee and McPhaden 2010; Newman et al. 2011; McGregor et al. 2013). If so, when might this change be identifiable in individual ENSO events? Was the extreme warmth in the equatorial Pacific seen in the recent 2015/16 El Niño, particularly near the dateline (L’Heureux et al. 2017), a harbinger of this change? To address these questions, we assess this event using statistics of Niño3 (5°N–5°S, 150°–90°W) and Niño4 (5°N–5°S, 160°E–150°W) sea surface temperature (SST) indices, derived from observational datasets and coupled general circulation model simulations. We use two indices to capture differences between events, important to both forecasts and diagnosis of ENSO and its impacts (Compo and Sardeshmukh 2010; Capotondi et al. 2015).
The U.S. National Blend of Models provides statistically postprocessed, high-resolution multimodel ensemble guidance, providing National Weather Servi...
Southern Africa precipitation during December–March (DJFM), the height of the rainy season, is closely related with two modes of climate variability...
Aircraft dropsonde observations provide the most comprehensive measurements to date of horizontal water vapor transport in atmospheric rivers (ARs). T...
Record-breaking extreme storms were a hallmark of 2017 in the United States. An extremely wet winter on the West Coast and brutally damaging hurricane...
This is a story of two extreme events—one that was expected but failed to occur and the other that actually did occur but was not anticipated. The o...
Salt marshes provide valuable services, such as protecting the coastfrom storms, removing excess nutrient pollution from water, and long‐term burial...
Greenland Ice Sheet surface temperatures are controlled by an exchange of energy at the surface, which includes radiative, turbulent, and ground heat ...
Earlier studies of spatial variability in sea surface temperature (SST) using ship-based radiometric data suggested that variability at scales smaller...
Salt marsh ecosystems rely on carbon accumulation to increaseelevation and survive sea level rise. The amount of carbon accumulated in a marsh is the ...
Polarimetric radar measurements and products perform as the cornerstones of modern severe weather warning and nowcast systems. Two radar quantitative ...
The partitioning of precipitation into frozen and liquid components influences snow-derived water resources and flood hazards in mountain environments...
Observations of turbulence in the planetary boundary layer are critical for developing and evaluating boundary layer parameterizations in mesoscale nu...
During the eXperimental Planetary boundary layer Instrumentation Assessment (XPIA) campaign, which was carried out at the Boulder Atmospheric Observat...
2017 | Geophysical Research Letters 44(7): 3184-3192, 2017
Description:
The recent multiyear drought over California was characterized by large precipitation deficits and abnormally high temperatures during both wet and dr...
To gain a more complete observational understanding of atmospheric rivers (ARs) over the data-sparse open ocean, a diverse suite of mobile observing p...
This study aims to address hydrological processes and impacts of an atmospheric river (AR) event that occurred during 15–18 February 2004 in the Rus...
El Niño southern oscillation (ENSO) events drive profound global impacts on marine environments. These events may result in contrasting conditions in...
Links with this icon indicate that you are leaving the NOAA website.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
(NOAA) cannot attest to the accuracy of a non-federal
website.
Linking to a non-federal Website does not constitute an
endorsement by NOAA or any of its employees of the sponsors
or the information and products presented on the website.
You will be subject to the destination website's privacy
policy when you follow the link.
NOAA is not responsible for Section 508 compliance
(accessibility) on other federal or private websites.