Yes. I think that all the weather this summer in the Pacific is an El Nino Harbinger on Steroids for the Western U.S. and the rest of the world.
Neoguri super-typhoon in Japan is El Niño harbinger
- 11:59 09 July 2014 by Michael Slezak
(Image: Alexander Gerst/ESA/NASA)
An unusually early Pacific super-typhoon
with a wrinkle has led to more than half a million people in Japan being
advised to evacuate their homes this week.
The category 4 super-typhoon Neoguri spun up winds of more than 200 kilometres per hour before it dropped to category 3 and passed Okinawa on Tuesday, where it caused substantial flooding. By the time it reaches mainland Japan, it is expected to drop to category 1. It was probably sparked by a developing El Niño.
Meteorologists around the world were
intrigued by a wrinkle seen in the image above, like a tail coming out
of the eye of the storm. These "cloud cliffs" are sometimes seen in
strong cyclones but nobody knows what causes them. "It's a kind of odd
feature that's got people talking," says Brian McNoldy from the University of Miami in Florida.
More to come
Although it looks like a scar where there are
no clouds, McNoldy says it's really a sudden drop in their height,
casting a shadow on the lower clouds. He says it might be caused by ice
being thrown up particularly high in the atmosphere near the eye by
intense thunderstorms, and then being spread in just one direction as
the storm turns.
As it has come unusually
early, McNoldy says we should expect similar typhoons this year. "This
is just the first time that all the conditions were falling into place.
There will probably be more," he says.
Typhoon Neoguri is probably the biggest storm in decades to hit Japan so early, says Hiroyuki Murakami
from the University of Hawaii in Honolulu. "Normally, the peak typhoon
season for Japan is between September and October." He says the strength
and the timing of the storm is likely to be a result of the likely El Niño later this year.
The warmer water in the eastern Pacific
is pulling their genesis that way, Murakami says, giving them more time
to grow in strength by the time they make landfall around Japan.
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