Formation Mechanism for 2015/16 Super El Niño

Abstract

The extreme El Niño (EN) events in 1997/98 and 1982/83, referred to as super EN, exerted remarkable global influence. A super EN was anticipated on the way in early 2014 but failed to materialize toward the end of 2014. Whilst the scientific community was still puzzling about the cause of the aborted EN event in 2014, the remnants of the decaying warming in late 2014 unexpectedly reignited since February 2015 and grew into a super EN by the end of 2015. Understanding the onset mechanism of the 2015 EN event and its differences from past super EN events is crucial for improving EN prediction in a changing climate. Our observational analyses and modeling studies demonstrate that the principal difference between the 2015 EN and the past super ENs lies in exceptionally strong and consecutive occurrence of westerly wind burst events that turned around unfavorable ocean thermocline conditions in tropical western Pacific in early 2015, reigniting rapidly the surface warming in the eastern Pacific. By August the sea surface temperature anomalies reached a critical amplitude similar to that of the past super ENs; positive atmosphere-ocean feedbacks further amplify this warm episode into a super EN by the end of 2015.