2026-2027 Record-breaking El Nino

[Terpeast]

3 minutes ago, bluewave said:

Northern Hemisphere pattern going into August still out of sync with the record breaking El Niño. 
 

 

 

Southern hemisphere appears to be better synced with the el nino, though. Not perfectly, but close. Troughs and ridges look to be approximately in the same places, albeit slightly off. S Pac looks like split flow, aiding those record snows in the Chilean Andes. 

[bluewave]

9 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

Southern hemisphere appears to be better synced with the el nino, though. Not perfectly, but close. Troughs and ridges look to be approximately in the same places, albeit slightly off. S Pac looks like split flow, aiding those record snows in the Chilean Andes. 

Yeah, that is what I noticed especially reading the all-time record high pressure in Australia with the -SOI and extreme conditions in South America.

Perhaps it’s related in some way to the record early stratospheric disruption last November. Following the strong blocking last winter, record low pressure developed north of Alaska during the spring and has continued into the summer.

This has been associated with the record ridging and heat across the mid-latitudes. It would be a nice topic for a research paper. 

[snowman19]

A small area of +10C is starting to develop in the subsurface

[PhiEaglesfan712]

MJJ 2026 ONI (NOAA): +1.4

MJJ 2026 RONI: +1.0

AMJ 2026 ONI (Eric Webb): +1.0 [NOAA's value came at +0.9]

[LakePaste25]

1 hour ago, bluewave said:

Northern Hemisphere pattern going into August still out of sync with the record breaking El Niño. 
 

 

 

Not exactly strong correlations to begin with in the NH, with the exception of the low southwest of the Aleutian’s that appears to be displaced about 60 degrees east. 

[LakePaste25]

For the NH at least, it appears to be a better fit for +PMM, which is an actual pattern driver much more so than the PDO.

 

[snowman19]

For the NH at least, it appears to be a better fit for +PMM, which is an actual pattern driver much more so than the PDO.
 

Completely agree about the PMM. Once we get into met fall and the effects in the NH start to become much more pronounced, I think that’s when we see a big pattern shift along with the change in the PDO. The +IOD just got going at the tail end of July. Once that strengthens throughout the fall and starts constructively interfering/coupling with El Niño, that’s when the big changes in the NH really get going

[bluewave]

38 minutes ago, LakePaste25 said:

Not exactly strong correlations to begin with in the NH, with the exception of the low southwest of the Aleutian’s that appears to be displaced about 60 degrees east. 

At least the PNA is trying to match the usual August El Niño expectations. But the other areas still have the lingering -PDO or La Niña influence. So maybe this is the start of the El Niño having of more 500 mb influence on our pattern. 
 

[Terpeast]

6 minutes ago, bluewave said:

At least the PNA is trying to match the usual August El Niño expectations. But the other areas still have the lingering -PDO or La Niña influence. So maybe this is the start of the El Niño having of more 500 mb influence on our pattern. 
 

 

I think there has been a repeated pattern of the -PDO diving in the warm season with the marine heat wave off Japan through south of Aleutians as a result of the 500mb pattern, and then it abates through the fall and early winter as the NH cools. It will be very interesting to see if the NH atmosphere fully couples with the El Nino once the NH cools, or if the -PDO remains deeply negative. I would not be surprised if the PDO rises to near-neutral levels, but if it doesn't, then we would enter uncharted waters with super nino + super negative PDO. I'm not sure that's ever happened before, at least not at this level.

[bluewave]

20 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

 

I think there has been a repeated pattern of the -PDO diving in the warm season with the marine heat wave off Japan through south of Aleutians as a result of the 500mb pattern, and then it abates through the fall and early winter as the NH cools. It will be very interesting to see if the NH atmosphere fully couples with the El Nino once the NH cools, or if the -PDO remains deeply negative. I would not be surprised if the PDO rises to near-neutral levels, but if it doesn't, then we would enter uncharted waters with super nino + super negative PDO. I'm not sure that's ever happened before, at least not at this level.

Yeah, that has been the seasonal PDO pattern during the 2020s. Steep summer decline followed by rebound back closer to neutral during the winter. Most summers the 500mb driving influence for the -PDO has been the ridge to the east of Japan.

This July the ridge north of Hawaii had a much greater influence. More like what we saw during a more Niña-like July 2012.

While the seasonal models have been missing this pattern since May, a rebound to a more +PNA and -EPO from August on is what they have been forecasting. So at least this element of the forecast may be in the early stages of developing.

But we are still getting very strong ridge amplifications off the East Coast and in the Southwest in early August which appears to be the lingering La Niña -PDO 500 mb pattern influence.

If even a small amount of-PDO influence at 500 mb continues into the winter, then it could mean a weaker or displaced Aleutian low complex relative to 1997-1998. The exact locations of the low pressure would help determine where the Nino ridge axis focuses over North America.

Any -PDO 500 mb influence could result in higher heights located south or potentially east of 1998 which when the main 500 mb ridge was centered south of Hudson Bay.

 

 

 

[LakePaste25]

How is 55 degree water “overriding El Niño”? I’m sorry I just don’t buy that 

[Terpeast]

1 minute ago, LakePaste25 said:

How is 55 degree water “overriding El Niño”? I’m sorry I just don’t buy that 

It's not the absolute temperature of the water. It's the atmospheric pattern above it that's been the driver.

[LakePaste25]

3 minutes ago, Terpeast said:

It's not the absolute temperature of the water. It's the atmospheric pattern above it that's been the driver.

Yes. -PDO is not the cause, it’s an effect of the pattern. 

[Terpeast]

2 hours ago, LakePaste25 said:

Yes. -PDO is not the cause, it’s an effect of the pattern. 

I think there's been some conflation between the SST PDO pattern and the atmospheric pattern that drives this SST pattern. Many of us refer to the atmopsheric pattern that's driving the SST configuration as the PDO. I'm guilty of it, too. 

[ensonerd1233e343]

10 hours ago, snowman19 said:

This thermocline is ridiculous

The atmospheric response is more ridiculus imo

[Stormchaserchuck1]

Did we break any records today with the 500mb trough over the Arctic? It got down to 5030dm I think. I know at the end of last Aug we set an all time N. Hemisphere record for Aug at something like 4980dm. 

[BlizzardWx]

I thought this was an interesting plot I saw on X. Any thoughts on how far east actual convection will fire within the ENSO regions? Sure seems like it'll be further east than ever before. I was actually have a hard time getting a straight answer but at least for the Galapagos Island the average is highest at around 77F in Jan-Mar. If it were to maintain a ~5C anomaly that would be 86F. One would think that would be enough. Did that happen in 97? Just trying to contextualize all this. 

[EasternLI]

6 hours ago, LakePaste25 said:

Yes. -PDO is not the cause, it’s an effect of the pattern. 

 

3 hours ago, Terpeast said:

I think there's been some conflation between the SST PDO pattern and the atmospheric pattern that drives this SST pattern. Many of us refer to the atmopsheric pattern that's driving the SST configuration as the PDO. I'm guilty of it, too. 

 

I think you're both right. The SST PDO is a reflection of a propensity of the atmosphere to favor that state. Whether that is positive or negative. There are also far longer term oscillations known, such as the IPO. Which can have a period of 40-60 years. I personally believe the IPO explains the long term negative period we have witnessed.  There are also short term (+PDO) events within a long term -IPO, and vice versa. Although they are shorter lived than they otherwise would be when they oppose the IPO. With the + or - phase dominant over that entire period depending on the IPO. We are currently in a negative phase. We have been since the late 1990's. For one reason or another, the atmosphere has been predisposed towards -PDO thanks to that. I actually think this explains quite well a year like 23-24(-IPO). Where you can get an el nino with a -PDO. Or on the flip side, a year like 95-96(+IPO). Where you can get a la nina with a +PDO. The EOF of a +IPO is posted below followed by a few studies. Pay extra attention to the second one, as it relates to the North Pacific.

 

Powerful enso events have the potential to flip the Pacific. As the la nina following 97-98 is attributed to beginning this current negative IPO phase. So we're closing in on 30 years now. In this context, I find an inbound record breaking el nino all the more interesting. There's a shot at flipping the longer term Pacific to something more like the following EOF. Instead of the opposite, which we've become accustomed to. The record wildfires in Australia several years ago also may have acted to extend this negative period beyond what it otherwise would have been. By driving the triple dip la nina of the 2020's. In fact it's been postulated that had those fires not happened. 2015-16 likely would have begun the transition to +IPO. 

 

 

The influence of the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation on Temperature and Precipitation over the Globe

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-015-2500-x

"Since 1920, there are two warm (1924–1944 and 1977–1998) and two cold (1945–1976 and 1999–present) IPO phases, whose change is associated with abrupt shifts in North Pacific sea level pressure (SLP) and contrasting anomaly patterns in T and P and atmospheric circulation over the eastern and western Pacific."

 

Statistical relationships between the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation and El Niño–Southern Oscillation

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-023-07035-8

" While the spatial SST patterns that represent the IPO and ENSO are similar, the IPO is meridionally broader in the central to eastern Pacific, which may be caused by a lagged relationship with low-frequency SST variability in the equatorial Pacific. In addition, North Pacific SST anomalies of opposite sign to the tropical Pacific SST anomalies is a unique feature of the IPO that cannot be explained by decadal ENSO variability. This suggests a clear IPO and ENSO relationship, but also independence in some of the IPO’s characteristics."

 

The role of interannual ENSO events in decadal timescale transitions of the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00382-021-05784-y

"A long pre-industrial control run with CESM1 is analyzed to show that there is a greater chance of ENSO activity to contribute to an IPO transition when off-equatorial western Pacific Ocean heat content reaches either a maximum (for El Niño to contribute to a transition to positive IPO) or minimum (for La Niña to contribute to a transition to negative IPO) as seen in observations."

 

2019-2020 Australian bushfire smoke, multi-year La Niña, and implications for the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41612-025-01204-8

 

[ensonerd1233e343]

56 minutes ago, BlizzardWx said:

I thought this was an interesting plot I saw on X. Any thoughts on how far east actual convection will fire within the ENSO regions? Sure seems like it'll be further east than ever before. I was actually have a hard time getting a straight answer but at least for the Galapagos Island the average is highest at around 77F in Jan-Mar. If it were to maintain a ~5C anomaly that would be 86F. One would think that would be enough. Did that happen in 97? Just trying to contextualize all this. 

Yes it is highly likely we see convection in the far epac  during winter provided it stays as warm there as 1997/1982 the real question is when we see that convection bc sst there rise throught the winter so by mar  you actually dont need to high of a ssta to get convection 

If you look at olr ( which is a measurment of the amount of longwave radation escaping earth negative values indicate cold tall clouds bc those block olr and thus olr can be used as a measure for deep convection) in 1997 we didnt get it till nov/dec ( depends bc nov had most of the convection slightly n of the eq in the far epac but some was on the eq dec was more uniform to the eq)  while in 1982 it didnt really happen til dec/ jan and even then its a weaker signal 

although still there 

likely weaker bc it was slightly less east based then 1997

 

[ensonerd1233e343]

The mei came in at the highest on record for june  july at 2.41 just ahead of 1997 which had a june july value of 2.27 

To me the coupling of this nino has almost gone under the radar

[so_whats_happening]

14 hours ago, 40/70 Benchmark said:

This is the one that I use, as I have found that the other reading hasn't accurately depicted the severity of this Pacific cold phase throughout the 2020's.

 

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monitoring/pdo/

 

The one you seem to be discrediting has actually been more negative than the one you posted.

2020 -1.41 -1.48 -1.75 -1.32 -0.52 -0.75 -0.92 -1.33 -1.04 -0.62 -1.58 -0.98
2021 -0.61 -1.09 -1.67 -1.84 -2.04 -1.82 -2.00 -0.95 -1.96 -3.14 -2.75 -2.71
2022 -2.40 -1.91 -1.67 -2.09 -2.23 -1.31 -2.63 -2.38 -2.28 -1.81 -2.40 -2.21
2023 -1.24 -1.65 -2.45 -3.08 -2.41 -2.55 -2.54 -2.48 -2.99 -2.23 -1.79 -1.66
2024 -1.57 -1.34 -1.54 -2.11 -2.98 -3.15 -3.01 -2.91 -3.56 -3.80 -3.13 -2.03
2025 -1.29 -1.40 -1.12 -1.15 -1.66 -2.64 -4.21 -3.23 -2.31 -2.37 -1.51 -0.96
2026 -1.24 -1.00 -1.42 -1.62 -1.67 -1.71 -2.03 99.99 99.99 99.99 99.99 99.99

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/ersst/v5/index/ersst.v5.pdo.dat

Versus

2020 -0.79 -1.12 -1.68 -1.32 -0.68 -0.86 -0.77 -0.85 -0.75 -0.29 -1.23 -0.92
2021 -0.73 -1.29 -1.70 -1.77 -2.33 -1.89 -1.93 -0.84 -1.70 -2.69 -2.37 -2.47
2022 -2.22 -1.72 -1.63 -2.19 -2.44 -1.42 -2.44 -1.78 -1.78 -1.48 -1.83 -1.85
2023 -1.24 -1.79 -2.50 -3.13 -2.46 -2.67 -2.44 -2.02 -2.52 -1.88 -1.16 -1.20
2024 -1.48 -1.33 -1.27 -1.99 -3.01 -2.93 -2.62 -2.37 -3.10 -3.24 -2.58 -1.57
2025 -0.97 -1.20 -0.81 -1.07 -1.84 -2.62 -3.83 -2.54 -1.71 -1.82 -1.02 -0.39
2026 -0.87 -0.79 -1.18 -1.28 -1.64 -1.32 -1.29 99.99 99.99 99.99 99.99 99.99

https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/ersst/v5/v6/index/ersst.v6.pdo.dat

This one is the one that site uses.

[so_whats_happening]

Now I understand, we use MEI now that it has finally caught up but before it was discredited as a metric because it was not showing what people wanted. This thread gets more funny by the day. I feel I should just create a twitter account based off this.

[snowman19]

The mei came in at the highest on record for june  july at 2.41 just ahead of 1997 which had a june july value of 2.27 
To me the coupling of this nino has almost gone under the radar

The coupling is extreme. Biggest April - July MEI rise in history, like you said, up to +2.4 now. The highest MEI value we’ve had since 1998 and only 0.5 from the all time record of +2.9:

[so_whats_happening]

I would be pissed if this dude kept tagging me in everything.

[ensonerd1233e343]

1 hour ago, so_whats_happening said:

Now I understand, we use MEI now that it has finally caught up but before it was discredited as a metric because it was not showing what people wanted. This thread gets more funny by the day. I feel I should just create a twitter account based off this.

tbf i have only been on here for a week but i will say the index has its flaws for starters theres only one eof so if an el nino has wwbs centered slightly east or west of typical or if the olr response is aytypical ( but still nino like) that can hurt the index i think adding a second mei w a second eof could be usueful but the third issue is the variables people act like its represntitve of the coupled system but the atmosphere counts for 4/5 of the index so its really an atmospheric index, secondly all indices counting the same is also a problem, im sorry "v wind" should not count the same as slp which has a very tight correlation to enso. Imo we shoud also add upper ocean heat conent and u componet of sfc current and remove v wind but i digress. Despite its flaws its still good at capturing the atmospheric response to enso it just needs to be looked at alongside the maps for slp winds olr vp to confirm super nino coupling. So when ppl discredit it there could be a reason im not saying they are correct tho.

 

[snowman19]

And the MEI cope has officially failed miserably, down in flames!! Womp, womp!! The last 5 months have been absolutely hilarious. Let’s see…First there was the RONI cope, FAIL, then there was the SOI cope, FAIL, then there was the trade winds are going to come back cope, FAIL, then there was the ridiculous Modoki cope, FAIL, then there MEI cope, FAIL, now we have the -PDO cope, also destined to miserably fail this fall. Can’t wait to see what the next copium will be to downplay the strongest east-based super El Niño in history….

Have to post this again….makes me smile

[snowman19]

tbf i have only been on here for a week but i will say the index has its flaws for starters theres only one eof so if an el nino has wwbs centered slightly east or west of typical or if the olr response is aytypical ( but still nino like) that can hurt the index i think adding a second mei w a second eof could be usueful but the third issue is the variables people act like its represntitve of the coupled system but the atmosphere counts for 4/5 of the index so its really an atmospheric index, secondly all indices counting the same is also a problem, im sorry "v wind" should not count the same as slp which has a very tight correlation to enso. Imo we shoud also add upper ocean heat conent and u componet of sfc current and remove v wind but i digress. Despite its flaws its still good at capturing the atmospheric response to enso it just needs to be looked at alongside the maps for slp winds olr vp to confirm super nino coupling. So when ppl discredit it there could be a reason im not saying they are correct tho.
 

I get what you’re saying with adding an OHC component to the formula, but I think looking at it separately is just as effective

[so_whats_happening]

2 hours ago, ensonerd1233e343 said:

tbf i have only been on here for a week but i will say the index has its flaws for starters theres only one eof so if an el nino has wwbs centered slightly east or west of typical or if the olr response is aytypical ( but still nino like) that can hurt the index i think adding a second mei w a second eof could be usueful but the third issue is the variables people act like its represntitve of the coupled system but the atmosphere counts for 4/5 of the index so its really an atmospheric index, secondly all indices counting the same is also a problem, im sorry "v wind" should not count the same as slp which has a very tight correlation to enso. Imo we shoud also add upper ocean heat conent and u componet of sfc current and remove v wind but i digress. Despite its flaws its still good at capturing the atmospheric response to enso it just needs to be looked at alongside the maps for slp winds olr vp to confirm super nino coupling. So when ppl discredit it there could be a reason im not saying they are correct tho.

 

"The bi-monthly Multivariate El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) index (MEI.v2) is the time series of the leading combined Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) of five different variables (sea level pressure (SLP), sea surface temperature (SST), zonal and meridional components of the surface wind, and outgoing longwave radiation (OLR)) over the tropical Pacific basin (30°S-30°N and 100°E-70°W). The EOFs are calculated for 12 overlapping bi-monthly "seasons" (Dec-Jan, Jan-Feb, Feb-Mar,..., Nov-Dec) in order to take into account ENSO's seasonality, and reduce effects of higher frequency intraseasonal variability. During the typical height of ENSO during late Fall/early Winter, the canonical features of atmosphere and ocean anomalies are shown schematically below based on a composite of 11 historical El Niño and La Niña events. Key features of composite positive MEI events (warm, El Niño) include (1) anomalously warm SSTs across the east-central equatorial Pacific, (2) anomalously high SLP over Indonesia and the western tropical Pacific and low SLP over the eastern tropical Pacific, (3) reduction or reversal of tropical Pacific easterly winds (trade winds), (4) suppressed tropical convection (positive OLR) over Indonesia and Western Pacific and enhanced convection (negative OLR) over the central Pacific (Fig. 1a). Key features of composite negative MEI events (cold, La Niña, Fig. 1b) are of mostly opposite phase. For any single El Niño or La Niña situation, the atmospheric articulations may depart from this canonical view."

https://psl.noaa.gov/enso/mei/

What would this second combined EOF do exactly to help with this metric?

A 'V' component to wind is important just not as functional in the sloshing of waters as the 'U' wind tends to be. Wind and SLP go hand in hand so they should carry the same weight. OLR is covered over a very large area of the equatorial Pacific it literally is measuring the intensity/location of forcing within the atmosphere. WWBs being further east and west is also important into the evolution of an ENSO (El Nino) event.

I completely disagree that OHC should be added, SSTs do just fine. We already have RONI which is just stating the obvious of what is happening in a warming world with warming oceans. The only criticism I would have of MEI is it plays catch up in all events but it often signals when the state has changed properly.

We have been also noticing more lately that each block tropics/subtropics, mid latitudes, and polar regions have not been cohesive with each other. So while the tropics may be humming along in an El Nino the mid latitudes can react very differently and can be destructive to the evolution of ENSO in either state. Just as much as the northern hemisphere and southern hemisphere will experience ENSO events differently. This El Nino has been awfully more impactful within the southern hemisphere than so far in the northern hemisphere. This could change but have yet to see those signs show up in the 500mb pattern.

Unfortunately this has not updated for July so I can't do a longer comparison but over the time period of greatest warming and exertion of a changing ENSO state these are the 500mb maps and wind anomalies we have seen between these two events. We seem to be running out of resources for plotting data so we are left with what we can find.

Just because we are having something producing similar numbers in SST anomalies does not mean things will follow the exact same way as a previous event did. Overall this just tells me in the near 30 years that ocean temps have become dramatically warmer globally, to a rather drastic extent. The implications of such we do not fully understand yet or how it will affect these events as we go through time.

[so_whats_happening]

1 hour ago, snowman19 said:

And the MEI cope has officially failed miserably, down in flames!! Womp, womp!! The last 5 months have been absolutely hilarious. Let’s see…First there was the RONI cope, FAIL, then there was the SOI cope, FAIL, then there was the trade winds are going to come back cope, FAIL, then there was the ridiculous Modoki cope, FAIL, then there MEI cope, FAIL, now we have the -PDO cope, also destined to miserably fail this fall. Can’t wait to see what the next copium will be to downplay the strongest east-based super El Niño in history….

Have to post this again….makes me smile

You really need to start tagging other peoples work and not trying to show it off as your own even if it is from twitter.

[snowman19]

3 hours ago, so_whats_happening said:

You really need to start tagging other peoples work and not trying to show it off as your own even if it is from twitter.

What the fuck are you talking about? I don’t give a shit if you’re a red rag or not don’t you dare accuse me plagiarism. Show me what I plagiarized, let’s see it