El Nino
El Nino has been a reoccurring phenomenon for centuries. Man has only started to realize how much of the worlds weather is effected by it. The term El Nino refers to an irregular warming of the seas surface. During the last 40 years there have been 10 significant El Nino occurrences. Most affecting the coast of South America. Water temperatures increase along the coast as far as the Galapagos islands. Weak events will raise the water temperature 2 to 4 degrees Celsius and will have minor impact on fishing. However strong events such as the 1982-83 event will disrupt climate conditions around the world as well as local conditions. It has been linked to floods and droughts all over the world. Hurricanes and tropical storms are also altered in their numbers by El Nino. Therefore it would be very helpful for people if El Nino could be predicted and prepared for in some form. During a El Nino cycle there are many biological changes. Due to a depressed thermocline there is less photosynthetic activity resulting in a decrease in the primary life forms that form the beginning of the food chain. The warmer waters that are brought by these changing cycles hold less dissolved oxygen forcing fish to go deeper or venture elsewhere. Due to
When the easterlies are blowing at full strength, the upwelling of cold water along the equatorial Pacific chills the air above it, making it too dense to rise high enough for water vapor to condense and form clouds. As a result, this strip of ocean stays free of clouds during normal years and rain in the equatorial belt is largely confined to the extreme western Pacific near Indonesia. Dense tropical rain clouds alter the air flow 5 to 10 miles above sea level (ex. Rocks distort the flow of a stream). These clouds create waves in the airflow that in turn determine the positions of monsoons, the storms tracks and belts of strong winds above the earth that separate warm and cold regions of the earth's surface.(referred to as jet streams). The impacts of El Nino upon climate in temperature show up most clearly during wintertime. Most El Nino winters are mild over western Canada and parts over the United States, and wet over the southern United States from Texas to Florida. El Nino affects temperature climates in all other seasons as well. But even during wintertime El Nino is only one of a number of factors that influence temperature climates. El Nino years are not always marked by "tropical" El Nino conditions the way they are in the tropics. For research purposes an array of buoys were deployed in order to understand and predict ocean currents better. There are nearly 70 buoys moored with steel cable spanning between the Galapagos islands and New Guinea. They are approximately 900 miles apart in the east-west direction and about 150 miles apart in the north-south direction. Each buoy measures surface wind, air temperature, humidity, sea surface temperature and subsurface temperatures down to 500 meters. Some buoys also measure ocean currents, rainfall and solar radiation. The data is transmitted to operational weather centers all over the world where the data in analyzed and used for climate forecasting. Wind and ocean current data from buoys have also been used by nations to locate overdue or missing vessels in the western Pacific. Scientists are also trying to predict El Nino by taking advantage of observations from the National and Oceanic Administration weather satellites, scientists have been able to!
Some common words found in the essay are:
El Nino, United Overall, Equador Peru, Southern Atmosphere, America NASA, Nino Initial, America Water, Southern Oscillation, el nino, Pacific West, System EOS, sea surface, surface temperatures, sea surface temperatures, western pacific, surface winds, ocean currents, low index, prediction el nino, el nino occurrences, climate predictions, southern united, east west, coast south america, el nino event,
Approximate Word count = 2289
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)
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