What is El-Niņo?
1997 - 1998
What Did El Niņo 1997 - 1998 Bring to Canada?
How Did El Niņo 1997 - 1998 Compare with Previous El Niņos?
What are El Niņos Global Impacts?
Quick
Facts
La Nina
El Niņo is a warming of waters in the eastern Pacific Oceans near the
equator, thought to be caused by changes in the normal patterns of trade
wind circulation.Normally,
these winds move westward, carrying warm surface waters to Indonesia and
Australia and allowing cooler waters to up well along the South American
coast. For reasons not yet fully understood, these trade winds can
sometimes be reduced, or even reversed. This moves warmer waters
toward the coast of South America and raises water temperatures.
Warmer
water causes heat and moisture to rise from the ocean off the coasts of
Ecuador and Peru. The result is more frequent storms and torrential
rainfall over these normally arid countries. The added heat also
strengthens and alters the path of the jet stream, affecting weather
patterns worldwide. In North America, this typically means the jet
stream splits in the North Pacific, diverting storms toward the Yukon and
Northwest Territories, while leaving most of Southern Canada with a milder
and drier-than-normal winter.
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Reference: El Nino Fact Sheet - Environment Canada
During
the 1997 - 1998, scientists tracked the strongest El
Niņo in a century and
a half. For most of that winter Canadians found respite from winter
cold and a reduction in home heating costs.
El Niņo disrupted weather patterns in many regions of the world and was
usually blamed for droughts, torrential rains, sweltering heat and severe
crop failures. Scientists called the 1997 - 1998 El
Niņo Climate event of the century".
In
Canada, southern regions experienced a warmer winter with less rain and
snow that usual, while the extreme northeast region had below normal
winter temperatures.
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Reference: El Nino Fact Sheet - Environment Canada
-
Reduced
amounts of rain and snowfall, combined with higher temperatures,
brought lower home heating bills for most of Canada. The extreme
East Arctic was colder than normal.
-
Winnipeg
recorded its second warmest December in 120 years. In Edmonton,
El Nino-related warmth also helped to produce a record mean December
temperature of 2.4 C.
-
Precipitation
on the prairies was well below below normal, as most grain- and central
regions received on-half tone-quarter their normal amounts
during November and December.
-
Fanned
by strong winds, a mid-December grass fire of Southern Alberta in the
Porcupine Hills raged out of control across the parched prairie,
burning more than 2000 square kilometers of farmland and six houses,
destroying 100 head of cattle, and burning hundreds of kilometers of
fencing and winter hay supplies for many farmers.
-
A
record warm February helped to produce the warmest 1997 - 1998
winter in 66 years in Southern Ontario. With temperatures 6 C,
above normal, February 1998 was the warmest in over 100 years of
record keeping across Southern Ontario. The city of Toronto had
the warmest February on record since 1840. The lack of snow
during the month was unprecedented; areas east of the Ottawa Valley
remained virtually snow-free throughout most of February.
-
Because
of the mild December, the ice wine industry reported losses in the $10
- $15 million range.
-
Canada's
worst ice storm hit central and eastern portions of the country during
the first week of January, bringing 6 continuous days of freezing rain
that totaled 90mm. Trees snapped, hydro poles and wires went
down and transportation from Eastern Ontario to Prince Edward Island
was halted. Although ice storms in Eastern Canada are not
frequent during El
Niņo winters, it is believed El
Niņo played a
significant role insetting the stage for prolonged periods of freezing
rain.
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Reference: El Nino Fact Sheet - Environment Canada
During
the fall of 1997 El
Niņo showed signs of being the strongest since
extensive seal surface temperature observations began in the earlier half
of this century. Its strength surpassed the 1982 -1983 event, which
at the time was dubbed "the El
Niņo of the century"
Surface
temperatures of the Pacific Ocean off the coasts of Ecuador and Peru rose
to about 5 C above normal, the highest observed in the last 50
years. These warm waters occupied an area of about 14 million square
km - about 1 1/2 times the size of Canada. At the same time, sea
surface temperatures off Canada's Pacific coast averaged about 2 to 3 C
above normal. Such strong El
Niņo conditions presented climatologists
with the best opportunity to produce reliable seasonal predictions.
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Reference: El Nino Fact Sheet - Environment Canada
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