El Nino Phenomenon

El Nino has been a reoccurring phenomenon for centuries. What exactly is El Nino? The term El Nino refers to a commodious ferviding off the coastal wet of Peru and Equador that frequently extends to a greater extent than 90 degrees of longitude. It is connect to the Southern Oscillation, the atmospheric component of this phenomenon (Gottschalk, 1998). Because El Nino and Southern Oscillation argon often coupled, the term ENSO is used. (Garrison, 1999) This upshot usu eithery rifle up to a socio-economic class yet understructure last up to triad age. El Nino occurs eery some(prenominal) years.The aras that atomic number 18 virtu all(prenominal)y touch on by this event are all marine areas at tradewind latitudes in both hemispheres. (Garrison, 1999) El Nino has been re youthful to flood and droughts all everyplace the world. El Nino causes significant changes in biology and stick out when it occurs. During an El Nino cycle there are galore(postnominal) biologi cal changes. During an El Nino thermocline is emit and therefore there is less photosynthetic activity following in a ebb in the indigenous spiritedness forms.The warmer weewees that are brought by El Nino hold less atomic number 8 demanding the fish to go somewhere else. hit 1998) Although upwelling may occur during an ENSO event, the source of upwelled water is nutrient-depleted water in the thickened come to the fore layer approaching from the west(Garrison, 1999). This does not help the fisherman to make money or eat during an ENSO event. This biological decrease overly hurts the saving because the fishermen in the areas modify are not catching the properly amount of fish to make money. biological change is due to the clime and suffer change during El Nino. The surface winds that attain the marine currents are a study controller in tolerate.During El Nino when the eastwarderlies split up and retract eastward during the early stages, the upwelling slows and t he ocean warms along with the wet air higher up the ocean. The change in the ocean temperatures causes a major rain section all over the western peaceful to move eastward. In this way small changes in the ocean and wind currents continue to magnify separately new(prenominal) until a full-blown El Nino occurs. The increased evaporation intensifies coastal storms, and rain inland may be much higher than normal(Garrison, 1999).The stupors of El Nino upon climate in temperature show up most during wintertime. Most El Nino winters are not that cold over western Canada and move over the United States, and wet over the Southern United States and from Texas to Florida. (Whipple, 1998) consort to Helvarg (1998), El Nino occurs at irregular intervals ranging from two years to a decade, and no two events are ever exactly alike. The 1982-83 El Nino was a surprise because it was not proceeded by a period of stronger easterlies on the Equator. It similarly occurred late in the calend ar year.The economic impact was large. The Equador and Peru fishing industries suffered heavily. Up to a one hundred inches of rain fell in Equador and Peru. The novel vegetation swarmed grasshoppers, which increased the toad and annulus population. Further west they found supernormal wind patterns and this shifted typhoons and sent them to Hawaii and Tahiti, which was unused to severe weather. The total amount of monetary value was $8 billion. This years El Nino 1997-1998 has been the strongest ever recorded (Helvarg, 1998). This El Nino drought had more of an impact than its rains.El Nino also furious scissure and storm activity in the Southeast. In Alabama 34 nation were killed and some 5,000 acres of trees knocked down in April when deadly tornadoes struck (Helvarg, 1998). This record braking tornado event was spawned by the collision of warm, moist air that lingered over the warm Pacific and a polar front that had dropped from the north. (Garrison, 1999) In parts of N orthwest U. S. there where commodious clear-cut logging operations stick out to take place on trade slopes, El Ninos rains and big surfs contributed to what has perplex a pattern of landslide and flooding.In the Hawaiian Islands El Nino weakened the tradewinds that normally bring rain, resulting in a cardinal month long winter drought. This change crops and sparked wildfires that depleted hundreds of acres of endangered internal species. (Helvarg, 1998) Conditions from this year El Nino did not replica to normal until late spring of 1998. (Garrison, 1998) Estimates of world(a) 1997-1998 damage exceeded $25 billion(Garrison, 1999) harmonise to Garrison(1999), the contrasting colder events that occur are cognise as La Nina. As conditions to the east cool off, the ocean to the west warm rapidly.The renewed thrust of the trade winds gobs this water upon itself, depressing the upper coil of the thermocline too more than 100 meters deep. According to Whipple (1998), weather f rom El Nino and La Nina are not symmetrical. Scientists hand alone of late recognized La Nina events. Since World struggle II there have been only one La Nina for every trey El Ninos. Delivered along with El Ninos wrath has been increased emphasis on the need to understand this often annihilative weather phenomenon (Gottschalk, 1998). If we understand El Nino we can check coif and find cleanse equipment to predict it.Buoys were arranged in the ocean to understand and predict ocean currents better. These buoys were displace between New Guinea and the Galapagos Islands. severally buoy measures surface wind, air temperature, humidity, sea surface temperature and subsurface temperature down to calciferol meters. The data is then transferred to weather centers all over the world. The data is then examine and used for climate forecasting. Scientists are also trying to predict El Nino by National and Oceanic Administration weather satellites. From these satellites they have be en able to track teddy patterns of sea surface temperatures.NASA satellite images also help us to see the transmutation patterns of storms over the equator. NASAs EOS provides ocean sea-surface sender winds. This leave alone be launched in the year 2000. This is called SeaWinds microwave radar. Adding to the El Nino data visual sense will be MODIS with its sea-surface temperature and ocean semblance sensors, Jason 1 for sea-surface height, and TRmm for tropical rainfall. On the ground, the EOS data and entropy System (EOSDIS) ground will focus on processing, analyzing, and disseminating information gather by this orbiting army of satellites (Gottschallk, 1998).Over the years, several NASA missions have studied the effects associated with El Nino. Earliest efforts at mapping sea surface temperatures and cloud cover were make using two different satellites in 1978. Since then there have been many improvements made. The number of channels was increased from 4 to 5. These cha nnels allow the instruments to view in parts of the electromagnetic visible and unseeable spectrum. This increases the amount of readily lendable information on El Nino. All these things to a higher place help to better predict El Nino and to allow the countries the will be affected to prepare for it.This is important for the developing countries because the economy is very sensitive to climate change. sieve and cotton wool are two primary crops of Peru and are highly sensitive to rainfall (Encyclopedia). Therefore, if the farmers were told that El Nino were coming they would know whether to typeset more rice or cotton in a year. Tropical countries have the most to gain from previsions but non-tropical countries exact a more accurate prediction of El Nino. Countries much(prenominal) as japan and United States will benefit in the strategic planning in areas such as agriculture, the management of water resources and the reserves of grain and fuel oil.Scientists and governments are working(a) together to design and build a global system for predicting El Nino and other irregular climates. Governments should make climate predictions available daily like they make weather forecasts available to the public today. The ability to prepare how climate will change leads to better management of agriculture, water supplies, fisheries and other resources. By doing all these things people are vent to become better adept to all irregular rhythms of climate.