A New look at El Nino

To the casual observer it may come as a surprise to learn that the phenomenon known as El Nino is actually a yearly event. But the fact is that each winter a mass of warm water builds in the western Pacific. In the spring of every year this warm water moves eastward into the region of the dateline at longitude 180 degrees in the mid Pacific.

(figure 1).

This annual build up and subsequent migration is a regular phenomenon in the western Pacific. Occasionally the build up and migration of the warm water into the central Pacific finds conditions that support the further eastward migration of the warmth pool. This happens when conditions at the dateline and in the eastern Pacific support the continued eastward migration of the warm water from the central Pacific. It is known that the conditions that support enhanced eastward flow are rhythmic in decadal timeframes. This series of movements is known to climatologists as the canonical El Nino. However, the precise timing of the enhanced flows is not understood. If no support for enhanced eastward flux occurs at the dateline in midsummer then the El Nino will not move into the west coast of South America. No clear phenomenon has presented itself as the determining parameter of these patterns. In the following charts the archetypal movements of the warm water during a non El Nino year is illustrated.

Figure 2
The basic chart (fig2) divides the Pacific into five different areas. Nino 1&2 is the area just off the west coast of Peru. Nino 3 is the area in the eastern Pacific to the east of Hawaii. Nino 3.4 runs from just east of Hawaii westward to the dateline at 180 degrees of longitude, west of Hawaii. Nino 4 runs from the dateline westward to the east coast of Australia.

Figure 3
In January, February, and March warmth builds in the western Pacific.

Figure 4
In April the warm water moves into Nino 4 and the edge of Nino 3.4 near the dateline.

Figure 5
In May the cool emerges in Nino 5 and the warmth shifts eastward to the middle of Nino 3.4.

Figure 6
In June the cool settles into western Nino 4 and the warmth settles into eastern Nino 4 and central Nino 3.4.

Figure 7
In July the cool expands in Nino 4, and the warmth shifts to the east and begins to shrink.

Figure 8
In August and September the cool and warm masses approach each other at the dateline.

Figure 9
In October / November the cool water to the west meets the warm water to the east at the dateline. In December the cool and warm neutralize each other.

Occasionally, in a little understood periodicity, the warmth at the dateline does not neutralize but continues to the east, eventually ending up on the west coast of South America. Many physical hypotheses have been put forward to explain this mysterious periodicity. Research has shown that increased convection from many clustered thunderstorms at the dateline in the spring supports the eastward continuation of the warmth, sending subsurface Kelvin waves into the east Pacific. The physical cause for the increase in convection at the dateline is obviously that there is more warmth in the water to support convection. The question that still remains unanswered by the physical data is why there is so much warmth available at the dateline in some years and not in others.

In the following sequence, we will see the winter buildup and spring dateline migration described in the preceding sequence. What is different is that instead of fading at the dateline in the spring, the warmth will be enhanced and migrate toward Hawaii as spring unfolds into summer. Furthermore, this movement continues into the southeast Pacific, bringing warm water to this region by Christmas. This is the El Nino that most people recognize.

The sequence is the same as the first few images of this article. From January to June warm water builds first in the western Pacific and then in Nino 4. Then by April Nino 4 warms, as Nino 5 begins to cool. In May the cold water spreads eastward into Indonesia as warm water spreads eastward into Nino 4. In June the cool grows in Nino 5, as the warmth migrates into the whole of Nino 4 and approaches the dateline. So far the patterns are the same.

During El Nino years there is a shift at this time to a new pattern. This shift distinguishes a canonical El Nino from an El Nino event. In an El Nino, or warming event, the warmth at the dateline moves east of the dateline for the rest of the year instead of neutralizing at the dateline in July.

Figure 10
In an El Nino July the cold water spreads into Nino 4 bringing drought to Northern Australia. Warmth spreads towards Hawaii through Nino 3.4.

Figure 11
By August, a cold pool spreads through the western Pacific, while warmth travels east.

Figure 12
From September to November cold settles into place in the west while the warmth expands and spreads into the eastern Pacific. By December the entire Pacific from the dateline to Peru is the site of a large warm pool of water, and the El Nino reveals its impact on world weather.

This sequence is the El Nino warmth event. Research has revealed this pattern, and many indicators of it, but attempts to find reliable related periodicities in other phenomena have previously proved to be statistically weak. The complexity of the possible physical elements in such a vast time and space system is staggering. We could ask if there is some system in which the natural periodicities resemble the periods in the El Nino cycle?

Contemporary research in climatology is centered on finding such periods in the physical interaction of currents or in atmospheric/ sea surface temperature linkages. These researches focus on ever smaller micro data inputs hoping for a symptom at the micro level that may explain the oscillations at the macro level. This approach multiplies the variables within the system, which greatly enhances the possibility for error. Perhaps a research strategy that would yield some useful insights would be to look for macro periods even longer than the time periods in which the phenomena unfold. Since the periodicities of El Nino and La Nina phenomena are quasi biennial, or even inter decadal, it would seem reasonable to look for large scale periodicities with these time signatures.

The greatest, and most predictable source of large-scale time signatures available is the system of movements found in the orbits of the planets. It seems reasonable that if a natural phenomenon being studied manifests in periods of ten or twelve years, that a juxtaposition of these events with others occurring in periods of ten or twelve years would yield insights which could be statistically significant. This is exactly what was done in this study.

The El Nino warmth event and its periods were placed into a context of the direct and apparent retrograde motion of planets transiting the Pacific in a given year. Through this approach a strong correlation between the direction and timing of a planet in a given sector of the Pacific and the onset of El Nino was found. This initial theoretical insight was then applied to actual El Nino events and La Nina episodes in a continuous study from 1976 to 1998. A significant degree of correlation was found between the periods of planetary motion in a given sector and the particular climatic response.

We can recall that in the early part of the year in the canonical El Nino there is a strong build- up of warmth in the sea water in the Western Pacific sector of the Pacific Ocean. Physical research by satellite reveals that in this area a vast hillock of water actually mounds up, a meter or two higher than the sea level throughout the rest of the Pacific. Some force appears to be pushing from east to west mounding up the water. Physical influences such as the action of the easterly trade winds (east to west) in the Nino 4 sector have proved to be unreliable predictors of the onset of this phenomenon. This is especially so since in actuality the winter/spring buildup in the far western Pacific occurs in many more years than in El Nino years, and also occurs independently of the quasi- biennial trade wind oscillation.

Looking at the winter / early spring buildup from a perspective of planetary motion, we can formulate protocols for prediction which have been determined through observation. The first is that a planetary position in celestial longitude can be projected onto the earth. These projected positions are often coincident to extreme weather events. As a result of this projection technique it is possible to correlate positions in celestial longitude with weather events in terrestrial longitude. This projection method finds further validation when a planet at a particular position in celestial longitude moves into retrograde motion. A blocking high often forms in the projected longitude of the retrograde loop. This often observed phenomenon was the original stimulus to form an El Nino model based upon retrograde motion in specific longitudes at specific times.

Regarding El Nino, it can be observed that any outer planet in the longitude of the far western Pacific will have a retrograde period that is coincident with the winter and early spring warmth buildup in that area. In figure 13 this retrograde motion is illustrated using Jupiter as an example.

Figure 13
Retrograde motion is depicted with an arrow pointing to the left or west of Jupiter accompanied by the symbol RX. Direct motion is depicted with an arrow to the right or east. The arrow is accompanied by a D. The period of an outer planet in the western Pacific would be retrograde in January and direct in May. As a result, the retrograde motion (i.e. east to west motion) of any outer planet in the Western Pacific is coincident with the east to west movements of warm water in that far western sector each year. This was depicted in the second figure labeled January, February, March (figure 3) earlier in this article. Linking this canonical motion of the warmth plume with the movement of the outer planets in a given year we can see that the onset of west to east direct motion of any outer planet in that sector is coincident with the onset of the west to east migration of warm water out of the Western Pacific in the canonical year. This pattern in which outer planets are active in the Western Pacific is present in most significant El Nino.

Figure 14
Figure 14 depicts the retrograde and direct periods of any outer planet from March to July near the dateline. The dateline falls on the border between Nino 4 and Nino 3.4. The retrograde motion coincides with the critical dateline support that is necessary for the unfolding of strong El Nino patterns.

Figure 15
In the eastern Pacific (figure 15) the retrograde and direct motion of any planet in Nino 1&2 directly coincides with the canonical El Nino as planets in the far eastern Pacific go retrograde in June, building up warm water to the west (i.e. the tropical Pacific east of Hawaii). Outer planets in Nino 1&2 then go direct in either December or January, coincident with a west to east flow that marks the onset of warming sea surface temperatures in Nino 1&2.

Figure 16
Figure 16 shows a composite of the retrograde and direct rhythms of the planets in a month -to -month pattern. For our research this rhythm is overlaid with detailed Sea Surface Temperature (SST) data during the years being studied. In January of each year any outer planet placed in the eastern half of the Western Pacific would have a retrograde period beginning in January and ending in June of the same year. This period of retrograde and direct motion holds true for any outer planet in the Western Pacific in any given year. The inner planets (Mars, Mercury, and Venus) move much more rapidly through their orbits and as a result constitute more rapid and local movement phenomena that the outer planets.

From the composite we can see that any outer planet in central Nino 4 near the dateline will go retrograde in February and direct in July. Any outer planet in the western half of Nino 3.4 will go retrograde in March and direct in August. Any outer planet in the eastern half of Nino 3.4 will go retrograde in April and direct in September. Any outer planet in Nino 3 will go retrograde in May and direct in October, and any outer planet in Nino 1&2 will go retrograde in June and direct in November or December.

These patterns of retrograde and direct motion have proven to be highly coincident with the seasonal fluctuations of warm and cool water in the Pacific when particular positions over the Pacific are occupied by actual planets. This kind of relationship was studied by gridding month to month SST values in all sectors of the Pacific since 1980. Retrograde and direct motion values and time frames for each month were then integrated into the SST values. Strong correspondences in this study provided the basis for this article.

Since the pool of warmth builds in the western Pacific every year, and every year there is a gathering of warmth at the dateline in the spring, it seems logical that there is an influence that supports this. Some years, the pool of warm water at mid Pacific finds support for flowing to the east at midsummer in the end of June. This is precisely the time period for a shift in direction of any outer planet positioned in celestial longitude near the dateline.

Many case studies of these phenomena have been made. These studies have consistently shown that the placement of planets over the Pacific and the timing of their retrograde and direct motions has a strong and remarkably detailed correspondence to the movements of the Sea Surface Temperatures in the longitude of the movements.

This is the general rule. However, this pattern is affected by two variables. The first is that initial conditions greatly effect whether or not it is warmth or cold that is in flux. If cool water is to the west when a planet goes direct then the records show that there will often be cool water going to the east for the next few months. If warm water is to the west when a planet goes direct, then, the records show that there will often be warm water going to the east in the next few months.

The second variable that disturbs the flow of water in response to planetary motion is the intrusion of a loop of Mars, Mercury, or Venus over the Pacific in a given year. These movements greatly modify the canonical El Nino into biennial and decadal rhythms. The record El Nino of 1997/ 98 was stopped dead in its tracks by a combined retrograde motion of Mercury and Venus in the eastern Pacific in December of 1997. Only when they went direct did the El Nino influenced weather patterns move into the coast. The looping rhythms of the inner planets have proven to be coincident with such unusual conditions in a given season. The qualities of the effects are the same for inner planets as they are for outer planets. The effects are just placed into slower or faster time frames.

The classic El Nino of 1982/83 has been the subject of a detailed study presented in three sections on this site. The decade of 1990 to 2000 is the subject of a work in preparation. These El Nino year case studies fit very well into the fundamental modeling parameters given in this present work. When working with this model, remarkable coincidences between planetary motion and the shifts of the ocean / atmosphere linkages can often be observed.