The El Niño phenomenon influences the weather in distant regions, as far away as the USA, India or the Mediterranean region.
The El Niño phenomenon influences the weather in distant regions, as far away as the USA, India or the Mediterranean region. But how exactly these so-called teleconnections actually work has not yet been clarified completely. Atmospheric researchers at the University of Vienna have now succeeded in demonstrating that variations of the transport of air mass, heat, moisture and energy from the tropical Pacific are responsible for many of these climate anomalies. And: El Niño also warms up the Atlantic, according to the study recently published in the journal "Geophysical Research Letters".
The El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is one of the most important modes of climate variability worldwide, with large impacts on the weather conditions in many regions, and thus on agriculture and economy. It is related to changes in the sea surface temperatures in the Tropical Pacific Ocean. Periods with higher temperatures cause the so-called El Niño phenomenon. This phenomenon causes pronounced weather anomalies in many regions around the world, for example, droughts in the Amazon basin. These far-ranging impacts are called teleconnections.
Breakthrough Regarding the Role of Air Mass Transport
Despite of a lot of research that has been done on ENSO, the mechanisms behind the observed teleconnections are still not well understood. Researchers at the University of Vienna now made a breakthrough in our understanding of the role of air mass transport in these teleconnections. They found that variations of the transport of air mass, heat, moisture and energy from the Tropical Pacific are causally responsible for many of the observed climate anomalies.
Read more at University of Vienna
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