A short explainer on how El Niño works [video] (youtube.com)

146 points by nharada 5 hours ago

breakyerself 5 hours ago

Any time this stuff comes up it's important to understand that this el Nino is occuring in the context of a global climate that is warmer than any time in the last 125,000 years. The risks inherent to weather and climate are growing all the time.

Loquebantur 3 hours ago

The important part to understand here is the childish reaction by major parts of the US populace to the outsize responsibility their country has for the catastrophic development of the global climate.

Instead of acknowledging the scientific facts and the ethical implications thereof, they engage in "catch me if you can"-tactics.

They let themselves be willfully utilized as a shield of ignorance against the financial restitution they owe. Not to speak of the implied loss of influence in the world economy after fossil fuels are phased out.

rustcleaner 2 hours ago

It's because carbon reduction has not been disconnected from material impoverishment. We need more stuff moving; we need more housing, we need more transport, we need more food, we need more energy, we need more children. Carbon reduction's story is one of denying/reducing these things in the name of saving planet earth. The answer needs to be doing both: reducing carbon and making more houses and food and energy and babies. Nobody really wants to be DINK pod-people who have little optionality in life activities, and that's what climate change warriors are selling them.

jibalt 8 minutes ago

Loquebantur an hour ago

lotsofpulp an hour ago

bko 2 hours ago

US has reduced their global carbon emissions over the last 20 years. We were a peak of 55% of global emissions to less than 13% today, and continue to drop (we were 23% in 2000).

Even when adjusting for trade, it is down considerably over the last 20 years. Mainly due to dematerialization, basically a free market economy doing more with less (e.g. efficient packaging uses less materials and is cheaper).

US and the Western world can continue reducing carbon emissions and it won't make a bit of difference.

Try spending 5 minutes on google before you spout uniformed opinions

https://ourworldindata.org/profile/co2/united-states

https://ourworldindata.org/consumption-based-co2

defrost 5 minutes ago

suprjami an hour ago

Noaidi an hour ago

willmadden 28 minutes ago

echelon 2 hours ago

Catch-22:

Telling them this will make them vote even stronger in the other way. Especially if you call them stupid, selfish, etc.

You have to show them how it impacts eg. the cost of insurance for coastal properties. But even so, this is hard to convey. The people voting aren't feeling it and are told by coastal elites what to care about - changing their opinion in the opposite direction.

Some countries are even going to benefit tremendously from warming, eg. Russia gets more arable land and access to the North Sea, which is fantastic for trade, energy, and defense.

Loquebantur an hour ago

cmrdporcupine 2 hours ago

It's gotten bad all over the western world. Here in Canada, just mentioning climate change and policies to restrict CO2 emissions puts you in the political doghouse and gets you crucified on social media. It's just apparently not a concern now. Carney has eviscerated all regulation, and enabling exponential growth of the oil export sector is now a national emergency justified by tariffs, nationalism, national unity etc. etc.

Sorry, great grand-children. Pipelines gotta pump.

hax0ron3 5 minutes ago

ianjbutler an hour ago

noosphr 32 minutes ago

The link between El Nino and extreme weather is breaking down. The last El Nino caused an extremely wet summer in Australia despite a century of data pointing in the opposite direction.

The current one seems to be doing the same as the old one.

Climate is filled with non linearities and drawing straight lines from the past is a fools errant.

Least we forget the Sahara only turned into a desert when it got less sunshine.

criddell an hour ago

Is it important? The globe is warming and it’s the new normal. Explaining it one more time isn’t going to make a difference.

Those of us who want to see CO2 reductions need to find solutions that don’t lead to inflation in the short term. It’s probably going to be a technological rather than policy solution.

9rx 3 hours ago

> The risks inherent to weather and climate are growing all the time.

Risk is subjective, so this doesn't mean much without quantifying what you feel is risky to you. Moreover, of all the risks we have heard expressed in the population, there is no unary growth value. There is a change in distribution, and some risks have grown, but some risks have also shrunk. If you are relying on the reader to bring their own idea of what the risks are, this is almost certainly going to be false.

I expect you say this with good intentions, trying to instil fear in the reader to convince them that climate change is something to pay attention to. But this kind of "absolute truth" that doesn't hold up to scrutiny is what actually turns people off paying attention to something that justifiably does warrant attention. Let's do better.

tingletech 3 hours ago

I thought risk was defined as probability times cost (or at least that is what you are trying to minimize in risk management) -- so if the probability of costs goes up, would not also risk? You don't have to enumerate each specific risk to believe that risks are growing.

9rx 3 hours ago

breakyerself 2 hours ago

There is significantly more moisture in the atmosphere now meaning the storms that el nino brings will have a greater capacity to cause flooding. The water the piles up on the west coast of north America will be in addition to the sea level rise that already occurred. Making coastal flooding worse. A drier winter in the Pacific northwest means less snowpack and therefore less water available in the summer with global warming this is exacerbated by the loss of mountain glaciers which help balance seasonal variability. Heating the western Pacific means el nino has always been bad for fisheries there, but layering it on top of global warming can increasingly devastate fish populations there.

Our infrastructure and agriculture are designed around a climate regime that is increasingly becoming a thing of the past. I think your attitude about this shit is nonsensical

EdwardDiego 2 hours ago

esalman 3 hours ago

"Risk is subjective" until damages occur to someone and it's time to file an insurance claim.

9rx 3 hours ago

nsoam 2 hours ago

Sharlin 3 hours ago

"Yeah, tens of millions died and hundreds of millions were displaced, but in the meantime we made a lot of value for the shareholders so it wasn't all bad."

rene_d 5 hours ago

I find the Climate Reanalyzer graphs very instructive - at a glance one can see how extreme the situation is:

https://climatereanalyzer.org/clim/sst_daily

simpsond 3 hours ago

The anomaly map mode especially. Thanks for sharing. I made a toy site recently out of interest: https://elnino.observer

guilhermeasper 2 hours ago

This video mainly covers how it works in the United States, here's one for Brazilian people in the HN, from Manual do Mundo

https://youtu.be/tWhcTTC-pyw

_ache_ an hour ago

Here is one is French, very scientifically sourced, by a searcher of hugging face.

https://youtu.be/DutKGuQu4a0

France isn't very much affected, so it's not focused on any country.

romanovcode 4 hours ago

Title: A short explainer on how El Niño works in US [video] (youtube.com)

darkwater 2 hours ago

Yeah. I opened it, saw that the map was centered on NA, and I closed it. I was hoping a primer on how El Niño works globally, given the title.

heikkilevanto 3 hours ago

Yes, this was very US centric

jeffbee 4 hours ago

Actual title is "El Niño Winter 2026–27: What Pilots Should Expect"

slicktux 3 hours ago

Not that the cause is known yet but I’d been curious how this El Niño would affect flying after that terrible Florida Leer Jet crash. Great video!

vibebingo 3 hours ago

I would be curious too. That said each pilot must avoid dangerous weather. There is a recent captain steeeve video where the pilot does that. ATC won't vector them around the storm (not sure why...) so they declare an emergency then they are free to fly as needed to avoid it.