El Nino and the ENSO
What is El Niño and how does it work? ENSO refers to the El Niño/ Southern Oscillation relationship (an interaction between ocean and atmosphere) that strongly influences climatic variation in many parts of Australia, Latin America and Southeast Asia. ENSO can be best viewed as an irregular oscillation between El Niño (the warm phase), La Niña (the cold phase) with periods of Neutral (non El Niño or La Niña) conditions in between. In Australia for instance, it is the El Niño phase that receives the most attention due to its association with drier than normal conditions for eastern and northern parts of Australia. 3 out of 4 droughts in Australia occur during El Niño years. The term El Niño translates from Spanish as “the boy-child”, a reference to the Christ child, that was first used by Peruvian anchovy fishermen. This term was traditionally used to describe the appearance, around Christmas, of a warm ocean current off the South American coast, adjacent to Ecuador and extending int...