Saturday, February 04, 2012

Has The Current La Nina Peaked?

The current La Nina isn't looking very impressive, and might already be withering. Here are the 30-day and 90-day averages of the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) -- the SOI is based on the pressure differences between Tahiti and Darwin, Australia, and is a proxy for ENSOs (though perhaps not as good a proxy as the MEI -- Multivariate ENSO Index).


If so it would have peaked at about the same point as previous La Ninas, except for the really strong one of 2010-2011:


And already sea-level rise seems to be picking back up again:





So the days of having to explain to people that ENSOs cause fluctuations in sea-level and surface warming may be coming to an end -- though there is still the PDO and NAO to consider. It's always something, isn't it?
Posted by David Appell at 2/04/2012 11:18:00 AM

3 comments:

bob said...

possibility of a triple dip La Nina is not negligible. Ie La Nina fades by summer and then another La Nina kicks off.

Would just be delaying the inevitable El Nino though.

4:54 PM
riverat said...

As I understand it a major factor in the recent sea level drop was all of the heavy precipitation around the world in the last 2 years and the time it takes for that water to return to the sea.

12:58 PM
David Appell said...

RR, yes, you're right:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2011-262

2:09 PM

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