El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO)

ENSO's Effects on Global Temperature and Precipitation

Select Temperature or Precipitation Composite Based on Season and Phase of ENSO
Type of Event
Warm      Cold
Variable
Temperature      Precipitation
ENSO Phase (Year corresponds to MIDDLE month in seasonal average)
Year preceding start of event (starts Mar-May)
Year event begins (composite events start in autumn; 82-83 El Niño starts in 1982 for example)
Year after event begins (for 1982-83 event, would be 83)ends Aug-Oct)
Months: 
 Animate all maps


   
Temperature and precipitation anomalies have been composited for El Niño and La Niña years (from Kiladis and Diaz). Composites were done for overlapping seasons from the year preceding a peak event to the year following the peak event. The dataset used was the GHCN dataset available at NCDC (1857-1994). Anomalies were computed by removing the monthly means from 1951 to 1980 but were not standardized. Units are millimeters/month for precipitation and degrees for temperature Image/Product provided by the NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory, Boulder Colorado from their web site at http://psl.noaa.gov/.
This is a Research and Development Application