UK forecasts 'biggest' El Nino will smash records, spark hottest year
This year's El Niño weather pattern will be the biggest in more than a century and could make 2027 the hottest year globally, Britain's national weather agency predicted Friday.
The UK's national weather agency, the Met Office, has forecast that the upcoming El Niño weather pattern will be the strongest in over a century, potentially making 2027 the hottest year on record globally. El Niño occurs when sea surface temperatures in the tropical eastern Pacific rise, causing widespread changes in winds, atmospheric pressure, rainfall, and overall global temperatures.
According to Adam Scaife, head of long-range forecasting at the Met Office, the current El Niño is expected to peak at more than 3°C above the norm, which has never been recorded before. This would add to the challenges posed by climate change, exacerbating heat waves in Europe. The Pacific region is currently running about 2.6°C above a 30-year average, and forecasts suggest it could reach a 3.9°C anomaly in November.
While El Niño typically leads to drier conditions in parts of Asia, Australia, southern Africa, and northern Brazil, and wetter conditions in the Horn of Africa, Peru, and Ecuador, the unusually strong 2027 event may have particularly severe effects in tropical regions, including South America and the West Pacific. It is already causing below-normal rainfall in India, and the UK is expected to experience increased rainfall and storminess in November.
The British scientists emphasize that this is an unprecedented event, and 2027 is highly likely to surpass 2024 as the warmest year on record, given the current global temperature readings of 1.5°C above preindustrial levels.
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