SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
A powerful El Nino climate pattern is developing, and it could be record-breaking. International forecasters released that warning today. And they say countries need to prepare for more extreme disasters like floods or droughts. Joining me to explain it all is NPR's Lauren Sommer. Hey, Lauren.
LAUREN SOMMER, BYLINE: Hi, Scott.
DETROW: Remind us what is an El Nino again and how it can affect the planet.
SOMMER: Yeah, so right now, the Pacific Ocean is extremely warm right around the equator. That's El Nino. And this is a natural cycle that the Earth goes through every few years. That giant pool of warm water releases a lot of heat to the atmosphere, and that has ripple effects around the planet, you know, 'cause it can shift weather patterns. Some regions see more intense rain while others get drier, and as a result, there are more extreme floods and droughts.
DETROW: I have seen this El Nino already called a super El Nino. How strong is it expected to be?
SOMMER: Yeah, I mean, supercharged is right. Some people are calling it Godzilla El Nino. Today, the United Nations weather agency emphasized that it's very strong. This is Celeste Saulo, who is secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization.
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CELESTE SAULO: It may be stronger than anything since our monitoring began, so literally off the charts we have used for the past four decades.
SOMMER: This El Nino is still strengthening too. It'll peak in November and December, and Saulo says it goes into February of next year, if not longer.
DETROW: Any sense of what kind of impacts that will have around the world, then?
SOMMER: Yeah, the first one's pretty simple. You know, all that heat raises the temperature globally. El Nino years tend to be the hottest years on record. And remember, the planet is already hotter because of climate change. It's about 2 1/2 degrees Fahrenheit hotter from burning fossil fuels compared to preindustrial levels. So with that combination of climate change and El Nino, this year or next year could be the hottest on record.
DETROW: And we're talking rainfall, we're talking flooding. What parts of the world tend to be most affected?
SOMMER: Yeah, I mean, I should say there's no guarantees about what an El Nino will bring, but there are definitely regions that tend to get harder. So here in the U.S., the southern half of the country tends to see more intense rain, so that raises the chance of floods. And then the northern half gets drier, which is a concern in the Intermountain West 'cause there's already a drought there. And worldwide, both floods and droughts can have a huge impact on crops and the food supply, of course. The World Food Programme is projecting that about 50 million people could be pushed into food insecurity because of this.
DETROW: El Ninos make the planet hotter. We mentioned climate change is also making the planet hotter. Do we know if climate change is increasing the chances of super El Ninos?
SOMMER: It's a good question, yeah. I mean, a study just came out about that. It looked at El Ninos from the past thousand years. Julia Cole at the University of Michigan did that by looking at fossils of corals, actually, and she compared past El Ninos to today's El Ninos.
JULIA COLE: What we found is that the modern El Ninos are significantly stronger than the ones that we saw in the preindustrial era. So that leads us to believe that the strong El Nino events that we're seeing now are a consequence of being in a warmer world.
SOMMER: She says today's El Ninos are about 36% stronger, and that can lead to higher risks.
DETROW: Knowing these risks, what can communities do to prepare, if anything?
SOMMER: Yeah, communities are already thinking about that. It includes things like, you know, evacuation plans or prepositioning emergency supplies, being ready for those emergencies. U.N. officials say, you know, this El Nino forecast is so certain, it's so big that it should be a huge warning sign to get ready before this winter hits.
DETROW: That is NPR's Lauren Sommer. Thanks so much.
SOMMER: Thank you.
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