United Nations officials have warned that an exceptionally strong El Niño could drive ocean temperatures in the Pacific to record levels, triggering floods and droughts across the world.
The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), in its latest seasonal outlook, predicted that the El Niño event could become extremely strong, with temperatures in the central Pacific rising about 3.8 degrees Celsius above normal between November and January, peaking around December.
WMO Secretary-General Celeste Saulo said “we have not seen in our records 3.8. We have seen around 3 in some record El Ninos before, with very substantive impacts across the world. So we are beyond that limit.”
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El Niño is the warm phase of the naturally occurring El Niño-Southern Oscillation cycle, a climate pattern that influences weather conditions around the world.
The phenomenon tends to raise global temperatures and disrupt rainfall patterns across large regions, causing droughts in some areas and heavy rainfall in others.
The WMO warned that El Niño-related weather extremes could intensify pressure on housing, water, sanitation and health services, with flooding risks expected to rise in southern Africa from November.
The WMO and the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Tom Fletcher, called for urgent action to prepare for the anticipated impacts.
Fletcher warned of severe humanitarian consequences, describing the phenomenon as “this El Nino is the behemoth, it is a wrecking ball. It will tear through Latin America, Eastern and Southern Africa, Asia and the Pacific with extreme heat, droughts and floods.”
He also warned that about 50 million people could face increased hunger as the weather extremes worsened.
Reuters
