oceanlove

December 4, 2023 - July 1, 2024 After heating up the eastern Pacific Ocean for about a year, El Niño finally died out in May 2024. The natural climate phenomenom contributed to many months of record-high ocean temperatures, precipitation extremes in Africa, low ice cover on the Great Lakes, and severe drought in the Amazon and Central America. As of July 2024, the eastern Pacific was in a neutral phase, but the reprieve may be short-lived. In tropical latitudes of the eastern Pacific, the ocean’s surface cools and warms cyclically in response to the strength of the trade winds—a phenomenon known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO). In turn, the changing ocean disrupts atmospheric circulation in ways that intensify rainfall in some regions and bring drought to others. In May 2023, easterly trade winds weakened and warm water from the western Pacific moved toward the western coast of the Americas, signs that an El Niño had begun, after three consecutive years of La Niñ...

  By Kevin Keane BBC Scotland's environment correspondent Underwater gliders are deployed off the Outer Hebrides Scientists in Scotland are using robotic subsea gliders to check ocean currents for signs of climate collapse.   They are monitoring the "conveyor belt" which carries warm and cool water between the Caribbean and the Arctic.   Scientists fear a weakening of the system would have a devastating effect across large parts of the planet.   The Scottish Association for Marine Science (Sams) at Oban is deploying the robots on autonomous missions between the UK and Iceland over five months.   Atlantic circulation is important for distributing tropical heat across the world and keeps northern Europe at a more temperate climate than other locations on the same latitude.   How currents affect global temperatures Its collapse is referred to as one of the climate "tipping points" and there is some research to suggest it might be very slowl...

  September 2023 was remarkably warm and quite dry across the contiguous United States.   The month also brought record heat and flooding rains to parts of the nation, according to scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information.   Below are highlights from NOAA’s September U.S. climate report:   Climate by the numbers   September 2023   The average September temperature across the contiguous U.S. was 67.8 degrees F — 2.9 degrees above the 20th-century average — making it the seventh-warmest September in NOAA’s 129-year climate record.   New Mexico and Texas both saw their warmest Septembers on record, while Minnesota had its second warmest. An additional 10 states saw their top-10 warmest Septembers on record.   The average precipitation last month was 2.10 inches (0.39 of an inch below average), ranking the month in the driest third of all Septembers in the historical record.   Ohio had its fifth-drie...

  Antarctic sea-ice at 'mind-blowing' low alarms experts By Georgina Rannard, Becky Dale and Erwan Rivault BBC News Climate & Science and Data Journalism Team   The sea-ice surrounding Antarctica is well below any previous recorded winter level, satellite data shows, a worrying new benchmark for a region that once seemed resistant to global warming.   "It's so far outside anything we've seen, it's almost mind-blowing," says Walter Meier, who monitors sea-ice with the National Snow and Ice Data Center.   An unstable Antarctica could have far-reaching consequences, polar experts warn.   Antarctica's huge ice expanse regulates the planet's temperature, as the white surface reflects the Sun's energy back into the atmosphere and also cools the water beneath and near it.   Without its ice cooling the planet, Antarctica could transform from Earth's refrigerator to a radiator, experts say.   The ice that floats on the An...