El Nino Modoki! What is it and why it may be the other El Nino this winter

Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis of monthly tropical Pacific SSTA shows that these events are represented by the second mode that explains 12% of the variance. Since a majority of such events are not part of El Niño evolution, the phenomenon is named as El Niño Modoki (pseudo-El Niño) (“Modoki” is a classical Japanese word, which means “a similar but different thing”).

EL NINO MODOKI SHOWS

TWO AREAS OF WARMER WATERS 

The El Niño Modoki involves ocean-atmosphere coupled processes which include a unique tripolar sea level pressure pattern during the evolution, analogous to the Southern Oscillation in the case of El Niño. Hence the total entity is named as El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Modoki. The ENSO Modoki events significantly influence the temperature and precipitation over many parts of the globe. Depending on the season, the impacts over regions such as the Far East including Japan, New Zealand, western coast of United States, etc., are opposite to those of the conventional ENSO.

MORE ON MODOKI INCLUDING RAIN AND SNOW

PREDICTIONS FROM THIS OTHER EL NINO