Talk:El Niño

Map temperature units

What unit are those temperatures in the map?

ºC, as stated on the German wiki image this was taken from: de:Bild:Ninjo_deprec.gif. I've changed the article and image description to reflect this. -- Rkundalini 01:04, 18 Jan 2005 (UTC)

La Nina diagram

I'm quite sure replacing "breakdown" with "eastward shift" in the LaNina.png caption is not correct, so I restored the "breakdown" term. The equilibrium state consists of the Walker circulation and the ocean circulation in the same direction at the surface. These circulations are self-reinfocing, the more the circulation concentrates warmth and moisture in the west, the more the pressure difference, and the more the circulation increases, driving it to the La Nina phase. At some point, for reasons that aren't clear, but probably due to the inability of the western warm pool to get rid of heat, the cycle begins to reverse, with westerly winds disrupting things. This is the beginning of El Nino, and it too is self-reinforcing. The less circulation, the less temperature difference, the less pressure difference, and thus less circulation. In other words, the circulation does not simply move to the east, it breaks down into smaller less effective cells, which allows the ocean temperatures to equilibrate. This is illustrated in the upper of the three NOAA pictures as well. (28 Mar 2005 User:PAR)

As you say, there is equilibrium in both locations, so nothing breaks. The heat and moisture over the warm pool creates the thunderstorms and drives the Walker circulation. I'm seeing the situation as being driven by the eastern edge of the pool where thunderstorms can form. The westward winds along the Equator push the warmth, but within hundreds of miles of the thunderstorm area the surface winds are toward such storms so they tend to cluster. When the east edge of the warm area extends far enough, thunderstorms begin forming further east. This pulls air from the west and the cool precipitation chills the westward-flowing ocean current. The warm pool happens as far east as conditions allow, with either warmer weather or slower equatorial winds allowing increased warming. (SEWilco 20:01, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC))

Ok, I agree with that, but that means the Walker and the ocean circulation is weaker, disrupted by westward winds, etc. The phrase "eastward shift" gives the false impression that the strength and integrity of the whole thing is maintained and simply shifted to the east. Maybe "breakdown" is too simplistic, and we should replace it with some other term.

I was thinking of making a "El Nino" version of the La Nina diagram, and I had pictured it as having no particular ocean circulation, a number of smaller atmospheric circulation cells near thunderstorms distributed across the pacific. The water temperature and level would be nearly equal in the east and the west, and the thermocline would be nearly flat. What do you think about the accuracy of such a picture? PAR 20:17, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I have a few issues. (SEWilco 05:57, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC))

• A Wiki style problem with the La Nina diagram is that it has English scribbled in it. I edited the NOAA diagrams to only have a few numbers (including using Zero Degrees to mark Equator so as to not use the word).

I understand the reason, but I think removing words would detract too much from the diagram.

• The scale across the bottom with E|W etc. is nice.

I think so too, esp. with the Darwin-Tahiti locations.

• The La Nina diagram also does not show the temperature contours which the NOAA diagram uses effectively to show the warm pools.

I will do that.

• I do like your blue and red arrows, those are a good way to show hot/cold. Should use blue/red arrows in Walker loop. Could pull the Solar arrows up next to a Sun. I don't know if showing evaporation is important, as I think the precip balances it (isn't Walker air dry?). Red arrows could show inward sweep toward base of thunderstorms and upward. Similarly in ocean.

Anything to better illustrate the mechanism, yes. I wanted the heat arrows near the surface, to show that the ocean was being heated and evaporated, so the Walker circulation could move the resulting warm wet air and warm water westward.

• I don't know if El Nino has "no particular ocean circulation". The Humboldt Current is suppressed and the South Equatorial Current is throttled. In El Nino, the Pacific Equatorial Counter Current gains strength. There also are significant deep counter currents, but I'm not aware of El Nino studies of them...I'm sure "interesting but not significant" is the description for what happens as this deep water hits South America after mixing with the 200 m of El Nino warm water (maybe this reduces the northward spread).
• The deep ocean circulation loop doesn't seem to be as significant to El Nino. There are numerous slow flows in three dimensions, and the basin circulations take too long for feedback during the same year. The deep ocean circulation should not be portrayed in such a fashion so similar to the atmospheric.
• I think the El Nino temperature is actually warmer in the east (as opposed to "temperature anomaly" displays), so temp should not be nearly equal east and west.
• I don't know if an El Nino Pacific Ocean has a level surface. I've been looking at sea height anomaly displays and don't know true sea level. I think SST is more important than height... although warm water volume peaks before SST (!Maybe due to water bulge growing along width of Pacific — does volume drop when bulge leans against South America?).[1]
• The simplified thermocline is at least lowered in the east. I don't think flat is right, but I don't think we need the complex surface texture which it seems to gain. Maybe the Humboldt's inertia and source does keep it moving, but it certainly isn't pushing up compactly along the surface of the Peruvian coast.

With respect to the last few points, I would like a diagram to illustrate the mechanism of normal/La Nina, even sacrificing absolute accuracy for the sake of simple understanding, and ignoring any irrelevant factors. For example, if the sea level is not perfectly flat, but is reduced, and the reason it is not flat is due to, say, gravitational anomalies, or something like that, then I would want to make it flat. I'll think about this over the next week or so. PAR 15:24, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)

La Nina diagram removal

I noticed that the image Image:LaNina.png was removed. The problems I have with the present images, which the removed image addressed are:

• The ocean circulation is not shown
• The thermocline is not labelled
• The Walker circulation is not labelled
• The ocean height variation is not illustrated
• The atmospheric water cycle is not as clearly shown
• The locations of Tahiti and Darwin are not shown

I'm not sure of the drawback of the Image:LaNina.png except that it did not have accompanying images of the normal and El Nino phases. The present images (to me) are also too busy with three dimensions. Anyway, I would like to address the above problems. I can think of three ways.

• Improve the presently included images by adding some of the features of the old Image:LaNina.png image.
• Generate Normal and El Nino versions of the removed image.
• Some other possibility?

Any suggestions? PAR 22:07, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

I only removed the diagram in the course of moving up the La Nina text. I don't object to you re-adding it. Also, I now think there is a bit of duplication of text (I think we get the bit about upwelling multiple times; etc) but am not going to fix that for ab it, so if you want to... William M. Connolley 22:19, 22 January 2006 (UTC).

From my layman's point of view, the Image:LaNina.png makes WAY more sense than any of images currently on the ENSO page. I expect it could easily be copied & edited to show normal Walker Circulation and El Nino, by someone knowledgeable. -- TheMightyQuill 12:09, 10 April 2006 (UTC)

A sad situation

Fishing in warm water for cold-loving fish.

— It's a good thing Wikipedia doesn't support easily adding cartoon thought bubbles. (SEWilco 08:16, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC))

Commons

A lot of pictures, but nothing at commons. --Saperaud 2 July 2005 10:16 (UTC)

Cyclones

Sciguy47 08:26, 14 July 2005 (UTC) There is no mention about the possible connection between tropical cyclones and ENSO.

When's spring?

The article currently says:

A rather weak El Niño began in September 2004 and ended in the spring of 2005

In the hemisphere where El Nino occurs, it's still spring. Has this weak El Nino just ended? We should say 'September' then, for the benefit of our northern hemispheric brethren. Or is this a badly-chosen word, and it actually means in the second quarter of the year? —Felix the Cassowary (ɑe hɪː jɐ) 05:26, 5 October 2005 (UTC)

Pronounciation?

How do you pronounce this? Is it El N-eye-no or El N-ee-no or some other spanish way of saying it? --antilived ^{T | C} 07:32, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

The only pronunciation I'm familiar with is El Nin-yo, but dictionary.com says el-neen-yo; this difference is probably due to the differences between Australian and American short i/long e sounds, and corresponding differences in how we hear the Spanish i. The squiggle above the N makes the N sound more like ny; 'canyon' comes from a Spanish word spelt cañon, and there's also English 'piñata' (a papier-mâché thing filled with lollies you hang from a tree-branch or something that blindfolded children hit until it breaks open ... lots of fun as long as you don't break it open!), pronounced pin-yah-ta again borrowed from Spanish (and also again the American pronunciation of that seems to be peen-yah-ta). (The exact Spanish sound isn't exactly ny, just like the exact Spanish sound of the I is neither like a short i nor a long e, but it's the way English-speakers tend to hear it.)

So I spose, pronounce the -iñ- like you would in piñata. In any case, the ñ is meant to be -ny-, so saying it as El N-eye-no is wrong.

If you know IPA, I say it as /æl 'nɪnjəʉ/, but the American pronunciation is /ɛl 'ninjoʊ/; the Spanish pronunciation is /el 'niɲo/.

—Felix the Cassowary (ɑe hɪː jɐ) 12:15, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

OK, thanks a lot. I never knew "ñ" had a "y" sound. --antilived ^{T | C} 04:13, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Layperson reference

I'd like to recommend removing the "but the phenomenon was largely unknown to the layperson until 1997" from the opening paragraph. William Burroughs (William James Burroughs, 2003, Weather Cycles: Real or Imaginary, Second Edition, Cambridge University Press) says "it was not until 1982/83 that El Niño started to become part of popular culture." This matches my layperson's experience in the Western U.S. No doubt awareness differed in different places. Perhaps best just not to mention this at all.John_Fleck

Anti-Nino

I took out Anti-Nino. It wasn't (IMHO) very important and wasn't very sourced. Apologies if anyone wants it, put it back in if so. Google on "anti-nino enso" turns up 3 hits, I think all to the same paper. William M. Connolley 20:44, 3 January 2006 (UTC).

Page move to ENSO?

El Nino is merely a part of the system called ENSO. It would be more logical to have the main page as ENSO (or El Nino-Southern Oscillation if you insist...) and have El Nino redirect there. Opinions? William M. Connolley 20:47, 3 January 2006 (UTC).

OK... no comments?... I'm going to do this soon unless someone does comment! William M. Connolley 19:39, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

A person wishing to understand El Nino should be able to read an article which gives an introductory explanation of El Nino without having to wade through a bunch of other stuff. I'm not sure what you are proposing. A simple name change to the article would be fine, if its technically correct, but to merge the article with something larger would not. PAR 21:16, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

OK, sorry: to explain. At the moment ENSO just redirects here (as does La Nina I presume... yes), and El Nino-Southern Oscillation doesn't exist. I'd like to swap the redirects round, so that ENSO is *the* page and El Nino redirects to it (as does La N). There is no page text to merge in/to, and I'm not proposing any immeadiate changes to the actual text at the moment. Its would be nice to update the causes of "El Nino"; that really equates to "the mechanism of ENSO" since it really is part of the coupled system. William M. Connolley 21:54, 13 January 2006 (UTC).

Right, I've now done it, and await the complaints :-) William M. Connolley 22:32, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Why not move this page to El Nino-Southern Oscillation itself? --AySz88^-^ 01:46, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Agreed - Full-name titles look better, and you just know some company out there is going to be called ENSO. Percy Snoodle

I agree it should probably be El Niño-Southern Oscillation, with ENSO as a redirect. Pages should probably only be acronyms if the acronym is more common than the actual name. While ENSO is used quite a bit in the field, I think most laypeople know it as "El Niño." So, "El Niño-Southern Oscillation" should please the laypeople and scientists alike. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 18:48, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

I'm happy to move it (again... :-) but to "El Niño-Southern Oscillation" or "El Nino-Southern Oscillation"? I'd prefer the latter - fiddly accents in page titles is a bit of a pain William M. Connolley 19:02, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Hmmm...obviously with the tilde is more correct, but I agree that having it in the page title can be a pain. No matter what we call it, it's pretty obvious that most of the links to this page will be via redirects anyway. No strong opinion here; though I tend to like official names, I wouldn't be opposed to the tilde-less version for simplicity. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 19:12, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

OK, done William M. Connolley 13:46, 11 April 2006 (UTC)

I've fixed all the double redirects (about 17 of them, if I'm counting my contributions right), though I realized about halfway through that I should have gotten a bot to do it. Oh well. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 17:22, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Ha. Thanks. Just wait till we decide to move it to the tilde-version! William M. Connolley 18:34, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Then once I'm done fixing all those double redirects, outside forces will decide to move it back to El Niño, since its the most common name. ;o) EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 19:22, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Teleconnections

Hmmm, no mention of the possible effects of Teleconnections on the El Nino event. Perhaps someone with a bit more knowledge than me could remedy that?

Jargon translator

• inter-annual variability => the difference in temperature from one year to the next

Impenetrable jargon

Cut from 2nd paragraph:

ENSO is a set of interacting parts of a single global system of coupled ocean-atmosphere climate fluctuations that come about as a consequence of oceanic and atmospheric circulation. ENSO is the most prominent known source of inter-annual variability in weather and climate around the world (~3 to 8 years), though not all areas are affected. ENSO has signatures in the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

Would someone please translate this into plain English? The following terms are obscure and impede general understanding:

• coupled ocean-atmosphere climate fluctuations
• inter-annual variability
• signatures

Also, "ENSO" is not a familiar acronym. Unless someone rejects El Nino and La Nina for their Catholic connotations, I suggest we use these terms. --Uncle Ed 19:06, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I may have to revert you on this, but we can discuss it first... firstly, El Nino (or La Nina) are not synonymous with ENSO. ENSO is the whole atmos-ocean cycle; El Nino is the oceanic "signature" of one phase of it.

Do you really not understand "coupled ocean-atmosphere climate fluctuations"? That seems odd. It means, a mode that depends intrinsically on both the atmos and ocean, and the interactions between them.

"inter-annual variability" - variability between different years; ie the difference between summer temps from one year to the next

"signatures" - expression; manifestation

William M. Connolley 19:09, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

Terms like "coupled ocean-atmosphere climate fluctuations" are not easily understandable by the general reader. Please translate your jargon into plain English. --Uncle Ed 18:18, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

In the absence of a reply, I've restored the sentences, but wiki'd signature, and edited there William M. Connolley 18:21, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I guess the above wasn't a reply? Heh.

Here's more jargon to translate, cut from the intro:

a global coupled ocean-atmosphere phenomenon. The Pacific ocean signatures

Work with me, doc. --Uncle Ed 18:29, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

southern huh?

Cut from article:

The atmospheric signature, the Southern Oscillation (SO) reflects the monthly or seasonal fluctuations in the air pressure difference between Tahiti and Darwin.

Please define the following. Thank you. --Uncle Ed 18:42, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Jargon file

• atmospheric signature - try reading the version I restored where signature links; please don't cut this out
• Southern Oscillation - read the bl**dy article; its in there.

Come on Ed. Edit for style, yes. Remove substance of something that by your own admission you simply don't understand no. William M. Connolley 18:53, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

More caution please

Ed, I wished you would have discussed this rather than reverted. Jargon, even if inpenetrable to you, is better than incorrectness. The version you have left:

El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) refers to major temperature fluctuations in surface waters of the tropical Eastern Pacific Ocean...

is simply wrong. The ocean sfc t is only one small part of the whole ENSO phenomenon. The inpenetrability of the jargon means you don't know what is going on here, so you should be being more cautious William M. Connolley 18:45, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Ed has cut yet more "jargon" that he doesn't understand. I don't find this at all acceptable, so I've reverted his cuts. Please Ed you're going too far. One of the things you want to understand - signatures - was *in* my version and you cut it. How did that help? William M. Connolley 18:49, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Removal and "moving for repairs" are different. Please stop putting back jargon-laded text that no one but you can understand. It would be better to fix it, before putting it back. That's all I ask. --Uncle Ed 18:58, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you that some of the jargon needs to be editted, but "among other things" seems a little wishywashy for a good entry. How about the following

El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is a global phenomenon affecting both the ocean and the atmosphere. Its effects on the ocean, called El Niño and La Niña, are major temperature fluctuations in surface waters of the tropical Eastern Pacific Ocean. These names, from the Spanish for "the little boy" and "the little girl", refer to the Christ child, because the phenomenon is usually noticed around Christmas time in the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of South America. Its effect in the atmosphere, called the Southern Oscillation (SO), reflects the monthly or seasonal fluctuations in the air pressure difference between Tahiti and Darwin.

And maybe a link to geophysics or earth science, whichever is more appropriate?

What do you say? -- TheMightyQuill 19:30, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

Actually, if that's how we're going to define it, the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) section should maybe be moved up to #2 in the Contents list. Also, from what I can tell,Western Hemisphere Warm Pool and Atlantic effect should be full-fledged sections, not subsections. -- TheMightyQuill 19:41, 12 April 2006 (UTC)