In 2023 the Pacific switched from three years of La Niña to a strong El Niño. This video shows sea surface temperature from January 2023 to August 2024, compared with the 1971 to 2000 average. The first warm water appears early in 2023 along the coasts of Peru and Ecuador, a so-called coastal El Niño. On 8 June 2023 NOAA declares that El Niño has arrived. Over the following months a tongue of warm water spreads west along the equator, thousands of kilometres from South America. Around the turn of the year the event peaks, with the central Pacific about 2 °C warmer than normal. In spring 2024 the warm water fades, and in June 2024 NOAA declares the event over. Almost the whole ocean in this video is warmer than in 1971 to 2000. El Niño comes on top of that long-term warming, which is one reason 2023 and 2024 broke global temperature records. The chart follows two standard boxes: Niño 3.4 in the central Pacific, the main measure of El Niño, and Niño 1+2 along the coast of Peru.
Source: Data: NOAA NCEI Daily Optimum Interpolation SST v2.1, anomaly against 1971 to 2000, via NOAA CoastWatch ERDDAP, shown at 1° every 5 days. Event dates: NOAA Climate Prediction Center. Visualisation by The Moving Sea
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