Australia edges closer to El Nino

[webfact]

Australia edges closer to El Nino
AAP

MELBOURNE: -- AUSTRALIA is edging closer to a drought-inducing El Nino in the Pacific Ocean, the Bureau of Meteorology has warned.

THE BoM now says there is a 70 per cent chance of an El Nino by summer's end, up from 50 per cent just two weeks ago.

Above-average sea surface temperatures have continued to rise across the tropical Pacific Ocean in the past two weeks, according to the BoM's latest fortnightly El Nino Southern Oscillation Wrap-Up, released on Wednesday.

The Southern Oscillation Index, a measure of surface temperatures, has exceeded El Nino thresholds for the past three months, the BoM report said.

"These factors mean the bureau's ENSO tracker status has been upgraded from `watch' to `alert' level, indicating at least a 70 per cent chance of El Nino occurring," the report said.

Full story: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/australia-edges-closer-to-el-nino/story-fni0xqi4-1227128186461

-- Herald Sun 2014-11-19

[kinmaew]

Woo Hoo, come one come all the conservatives are running the joint now and its "Building Roads of the 21st Century" promotion time. We have an ultra right wing conservative leader who makes pon ek Prayuth look like a kinder teacher.

When will these idiots get it into their head, you build more roads, you get more cars and more pollution and incidents like this. I think I will have to run for government as an independent. "The easily annoyed party who loves boutique beer and kitty" I wonder if anyone would vote for me?

No one wants to take the challenge of building long term rail infrastructure here like the poms have done all short term views and its killing the world.

[Si Thea01]

Woo Hoo, come one come all the conservatives are running the joint now and its "Building Roads of the 21st Century" promotion time. We have an ultra right wing conservative leader who makes pon ek Prayuth look like a kinder teacher.

When will these idiots get it into their head, you build more roads, you get more cars and more pollution and incidents like this. I think I will have to run for government as an independent. "The easily annoyed party who loves boutique beer and kitty" I wonder if anyone would vote for me?

No one wants to take the challenge of building long term rail infrastructure here like the poms have done all short term views and its killing the world.

I don't vote for independent wallies, especially one who has no idea what he is on about. The cars of today create very minimal pollution, there is legislation to ensure they are manufactured this way. Are you suggesting we would get more old polluting clunkers back on the roads. Rail has always been highly subsidised in Australia by the state governments and if more were brought on line then the costs would be prohibitive owing to the size of the country and its lower population.

Just remember, Aussies don't like paying high fares and with the vastness of the continent the only way to get around at reasonable costs is to drive and with good roads those costs would be reduced markedly. Have you investigated the English rail systems, are they profitable, any subsidies and what are the number of passenger trips as compared to those in Australia.

When you can back you argument with answers and comparisons, then maybe then you can criticise the current government, who are at least creating jobs and trying to get the country out of the crap that the last government left the country in. And I include those two wonder independents Windsor and Oakeshott. By the sound of it you would have less of an idea then they did.

[ResandePohm]

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Woo Hoo, come one come all the conservatives are running the joint now and its "Building Roads of the 21st Century" promotion time. We have an ultra right wing conservative leader who makes pon ek Prayuth look like a kinder teacher.

When will these idiots get it into their head, you build more roads, you get more cars and more pollution and incidents like this. I think I will have to run for government as an independent. "The easily annoyed party who loves boutique beer and kitty" I wonder if anyone would vote for me?

No one wants to take the challenge of building long term rail infrastructure here like the poms have done all short term views and its killing the world.

I don't vote for independent wallies, especially one who has no idea what he is on about. The cars of today create very minimal pollution, there is legislation to ensure they are manufactured this way. Are you suggesting we would get more old polluting clunkers back on the roads. Rail has always been highly subsidised in Australia by the state governments and if more were brought on line then the costs would be prohibitive owing to the size of the country and its lower population.

Just remember, Aussies don't like paying high fares and with the vastness of the continent the only way to get around at reasonable costs is to drive and with good roads those costs would be reduced markedly. Have you investigated the English rail systems, are they profitable, any subsidies and what are the number of passenger trips as compared to those in Australia.

When you can back you argument with answers and comparisons, then maybe then you can criticise the current government, who are at least creating jobs and trying to get the country out of the crap that the last government left the country in. And I include those two wonder independents Windsor and Oakeshott. By the sound of it you would have less of an idea then they did.

Am I stupid or am I missing something here. What the hell has El Nino got to do with Australian politics. El Nino will effect the weather not any Australian politics. What a bunch of Trolls you are. Totally off topic.

[rickirs]

Although the Indo-Australian tectronic plate is currently moving quickly to the north-east at about 7 cm/year, I suspect it is El Nino that is edging closer to Australia.

[ronrat]

Meanwhile Brisbane is flooded.Again.

[lvr181]

Meanwhile Brisbane is flooded.Again.

El Nino hasn't arrived yet.

[floriamo]

take a look at this. there are serious facts!

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/jun/11/-sp-el-nino-weather-2014

[adn57]

Here are the facts :

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/ensodisc.html

EL NIÑO/SOUTHERN OSCILLATION (ENSO) DIAGNOSTIC DISCUSSION issued by
CLIMATE PREDICTION CENTER/NCEP/NWS
and the International Research Institute for Climate and Society 6 November 2014

ENSO Alert System Status: El Niño Watch

Synopsis: There is a 58% chance of El Niño during the Northern Hemisphere winter, which is favored to last into the Northern Hemisphere spring 2015.

During October 2014, above-average sea surface temperatures (SST) increased slightly across the eastern half of the equatorial Pacific (Fig. 1). The weekly Niño indices were between +0.6^oC (Niño-3.4 and Niño-1+2) and +0.9^oC (Niño-3) at the end of the month (Fig. 2). Subsurface heat content anomalies (averaged between 180^o-100^oW) were largely unchanged (Fig. 3) even as a new downwelling Kelvin wave increased temperatures at depth in the central Pacific (Fig. 4). The monthly equatorial low-level winds were near average, although anomalous westerlies continued to emerge on occasion. Upper-level winds were also mostly average across the Pacific. The Southern Oscillation Index continued to be negative, accompanied by mostly average rainfall near the Date Line and suppressed rainfall over Indonesia (Fig. 5). Overall, several features across the tropical Pacific are characteristic of borderline El Niño conditions, but collectively, the combined atmosphere and oceanic state remains ENSO-neutral.

Similar to last month, most models predict El Niño to develop during October-December 2014 and to continue into early 2015 (Fig. 6). However, the ongoing lack of clear atmosphere-ocean coupling and the latest NCEP CFSv2 model forecast (Fig. 7) have reduced confidence that El Niño will fully materialize (at least five overlapping consecutive 3-month values of the Niño-3.4 index at or greater than 0.5^oC). If El Niño does emerge, the forecaster consensus favors a weak event. In summary, there is a 58% chance of El Niño during the Northern Hemisphere winter, which is favored to last into the Northern Hemisphere spring 2015 (click CPC/IRI consensus forecast for the chance of each outcome).