Forecasters Say This Year's El Niño Could Rank Among the Strongest Ever Recorded

NOAA now puts the odds above 90 percent that this year's El Niño becomes a very strong event by fall and winter, with implications for rainfall, temperatures, hurricanes and a global economy that lost trillions during past episodes.

The United States' National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration now puts the odds above 90 percent that the El Niño pattern building across the Pacific Ocean will strengthen into a "very strong" event by this fall and winter. That forecast has meteorologists and researchers worldwide watching closely, because once the heat stored in the ocean spills into the atmosphere, it can reshape rainfall, temperature, and even hurricane activity across entire continents.

This particular El Niño has intensified at an unusually fast clip, and its effects are expected to ripple from commercial fishing fleets to mountain resorts counting on snow. Not every outcome is bad news. Drought-stricken parts of the American Southwest, for instance, could catch a break with heavier winter rain and snow. Still, knowing what is coming is the only way communities and industries can prepare for it.

A cyclical ocean pattern
El Niño is the name given to a recurring climate pattern marked by sea surface temperatures running warmer than usual across the equatorial Pacific. It returns every few years, and each occurrence sets off a chain of atmospheric reactions that touch farming, fishing, energy demand, and disaster planning far beyond the ocean itself.

How scientists confirm it is happening
Confirming an El Niño is not just a feeling, it comes down to crossing a specific heat threshold in a stretch of ocean called the Niño 3.4 region, a zone sandwiched between two other monitored areas, Niño 3 and Niño 4, in the east-central tropical Pacific. NOAA relies on a three-month rolling average of sea surface temperature there. Once that average sits 0.5 degrees Celsius (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit) or more above normal across three consecutive overlapping three-month windows, the agency declares an official El Niño.

Not every country measures it the same way. Japan's Meteorological Agency tracks a slightly different patch of ocean under its own rules, and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology factors in atmospheric readings alongside sea temperature before making its call.

What shifts beneath the surface
Warmer water is not the only sign of El Niño. The trade winds that normally push air and water from east to west across the Pacific lose strength during these events, letting water that would otherwise pile up near Asia instead pool on the eastern side of the ocean, closer to the Americas. During the two strongest El Niño episodes on record, in 1997 and 2015, sea levels in that region climbed more than 18 centimeters (7 inches) above the long-term average.

Uneven weather around the globe
These shifts tilt the odds of certain weather patterns rather than guaranteeing them, since El Niño is only one of several forces shaping any given season. Even so, the pattern tends to repeat itself fairly consistently. The American Southwest typically gets wetter, while the Pacific Northwest tends to dry out. The Atlantic hurricane season usually calms down, producing fewer storms than average. On the other side of the world, Indonesia and parts of southern Africa face a higher chance of drought, while Japan and sections of Australia and Brazil often see milder, warmer winters. Farmers, fishing operators, insurers and holiday planners in these regions all watch these odds closely each time an El Niño builds.

What makes an El Niño "super"
No formal scientific body certifies a "super" El Niño, but researchers commonly use the label for any episode where ocean temperatures climb at least 2 degrees Celsius above the long-term average. By that informal yardstick, only four events in the historical record qualify: the ones spanning 1982-83, 1997-98, 2015-16, and 2023-24.

When wetter weather still turns destructive
The 1982-83 super El Niño shows how a seemingly welcome forecast can still cause damage. Record snowfall hit the Colorado River Basin that winter, and once it combined with an unusually warm, wet spring, the river's flow swelled to more than one-and-a-half times its normal volume. Reservoir after reservoir upstream filled to the brim, forcing operators into emergency releases, and Lake Mead itself came close to capacity, sending water over the Hoover Dam spillway for the first time in roughly 40 years. The basin ultimately absorbed serious flood damage, a reminder that extra precipitation, however welcome on paper, can overwhelm infrastructure built for calmer years.

The 1997-98 event brought the opposite extreme to Indonesia, triggering its worst drought in fifty years. More recently, the 2023-24 super El Niño helped drive southern Africa's harshest drought in over a century, a crisis severe enough that roughly 61 million people needed humanitarian assistance.

How this year's event compares
Modeling from Berkeley Earth projects that average temperatures in the Niño 3.4 region could run 3.6 degrees Celsius above normal this time, a figure that holds even after adjusting for long-term global warming. That would top the previous record set during the 2015-16 event by roughly 0.8 degrees Celsius, a striking margin considering that the gap between the strongest and the fifth-strongest El Niño of the past 150 years is only about 0.5 degrees Celsius.

The speed of this year's buildup is just as notable as its projected strength. The 2015 event grew out of ocean conditions that were already trending warmer. This year's pattern, by contrast, started from something closer to La Niña conditions, with below-average sea surface temperatures, yet it is still on pace to intensify faster than the 1997-98 super El Niño did.

The price tag behind the pattern
El Niño's reach extends well beyond weather maps and into balance sheets. One analysis estimated that the 1997-98 event alone produced roughly $5.7 trillion in cumulative economic losses over the following five years, a toll that touched agriculture, fisheries, energy markets, and infrastructure repair across multiple continents.

La Niña waits its turn
El Niño's mirror image is La Niña, marked by cooler-than-normal Pacific waters and roughly the opposite set of effects, including a wetter Indonesia, a busier Atlantic hurricane season, and a drier Southwest. La Niña cycles through every few years as well, but with El Niño expected to dominate at least through spring, those reversed impacts are not the ones forecasters are watching for right now.

What this means for you
• Farmers and fishing communities: Regions flagged for higher drought or rainfall risk may see crop and fishery disruptions, making advance planning important in those areas.
• Winter tourism and drought-hit regions: Ski resorts dependent on snowfall and drought-prone areas relying on winter rain both have a direct stake in how this pattern plays out.
• Global economy: Past major events caused trillions of dollars in losses, showing how these weather shifts can filter through agriculture, energy and infrastructure costs into everyday prices.

Questions & Answers

1. What is El Niño?
It is a recurring climate pattern where sea surface temperatures across the equatorial Pacific run warmer than usual, occurring every few years.

2. How likely is this year's El Niño to become very strong?
NOAA puts the probability above 90 percent that it strengthens into a very strong event by this fall and winter.

3. What counts as a 'super' El Niño?
Researchers use the informal label when ocean temperatures rise at least 2 degrees Celsius above the long-term average; only 1982-83, 1997-98, 2015-16 and 2023-24 have qualified so far.

4. How much warmer could this year's El Niño be compared to the 2015-16 record?
Berkeley Earth modeling suggests the Niño 3.4 region could run 3.6 degrees Celsius above normal, about 0.8 degrees Celsius above the 2015-16 record.

5. How much economic damage did the 1997-98 El Niño cause?
One analysis estimated roughly $5.7 trillion in cumulative economic losses over the following five years.

6. How many people were affected by the drought linked to the 2023-24 super El Niño in southern Africa?
Roughly 61 million people needed humanitarian assistance during that region's harshest drought in over a century.

7. Which ocean region is used to officially declare an El Niño?
NOAA uses a three-month rolling average of sea surface temperature in the Niño 3.4 region in the east-central tropical Pacific.

8. What is La Niña and how does it differ from El Niño?
La Niña features cooler-than-normal Pacific waters and largely opposite effects, such as wetter conditions in Indonesia and drier conditions in the Southwest.

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