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Bob Bingham Blog page.

A series of opinion pieces on, mostly climate change and related subjects to do with New Zealand.

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Impending EL Nino warning and flooded Marshall Islands.

10/3/2014

4 Comments

 
NASA has observed an increase in the strength of the trade winds in the Pacific at the equator which is often a precursor to an El Nino event and they have raised the likelihood of it happening to 50%.  El Nino events bring a flood of warm water across the Pacific from the Philippines area towards the Americas and this upsets the weather pattern over half of the globe bringing floods to some areas and drought to others.

In a more stable La Nina situation trade winds blow from the Ecuador region of America out across the Pacific pulling up cool nutrient rich water from the deep and creating ideal fishing conditions.

This can be clearly seen in the Weather Undergound temperature chart with a cool (yellow) area close to the South American coast.


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The cool water spills out across the Pacific, warming as it goes.

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Sea levels are not even around the World, like in a bath, but can pile up due to winds or thermal expansion from increased heat. This illustration  is from a different period but shows what it would look like.


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The NASA Jason2 satellite shows that the strong trade winds are piling up warm water in the Western Pacific.With the extra strong trade winds blowing, the warm water builds up and heats and this will continue for some months until the trade winds fade and the warm water spills back across the Pacific in a classic El Nino situation.



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This chart shows where the heat is concentrated currently in the Pacific and the arrow indicates the approximate location of the Marshall Islands,


In a separate news item it was reported that the Marshall islands were flooded by extra high king tides. The Marshall Island in common with many other Pacific islands are very low lying and when you only have one metre of altitude for much of your living area a few extra centimetres can be critical between having dry feet or seeing your shoes float away.

Picture
This is not the first time these islands have flooded as the picture  from 2012 shows  but it does illustrate how little margin there is for safety.

Sea level is currently rising at 3.16 mm a year globally   http://climate.nasa.gov/  which to many of us is not much but if you only have 1000 mm total altitude a 500 mm sea-level rise would be critical ,then 31 mm every ten years is very serious and if you add to that extra strong trade winds to pile up the water and additional thermal expansion and you have a critical situation.

This is only a precursor for the main event and we will have to find homes for many Pacific islanders in the years ahead.


4 Comments
Robert Bristow
14/3/2014 08:00:48 am

Interesting piece about El-Nino and sea level rise, the Marshall Islands were settled in the 2nd millennium BC, and some crops are being grown in abandoned 55-gallon oil drums because the ground is now too salty for planting. The president states he would rather drown than abandon the Islands. Maybe he needs to start looking at floating homes and artificial Islands.

Because of climate change induced rising sea level, vanishing island countries like Kiribati, Tuvalu, Tokelau, the Marshall Islands and the Maldives will need to partially or entirely relocate their populations over the next two decades (Park, 2011).

http://www.jfs.tku.edu.tw/17-4/A01.pdf

Reply
Bob Bingham link
15/3/2014 06:35:20 am

The Marshall Islands are an American dependency and so the people are entitled to settle in the USA so that at least they have somewhere to go. Lets hope they get good treatment.

Reply
Markle
14/4/2014 12:10:57 pm

That's funny, here in California we have the different outlook on El Nino/La Nina. La Nina means drought, farmers and fisheries at each other's throats, and wildfire season extending year-round. El Nino means full reservoirs, overflowing rivers and creeks and weirs and *less* griping from farmers.

Reply
ALAMGIR link
13/9/2019 05:50:50 am

Interesting blog.It would be great if you can provide more details about it. Thanks you

Reply



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    Bob Bingham 

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