'Earth Almost Entirely in Red': UN Warns Super-Duper El Niño Could Intensify Last Until February 2027

Singapore: This year's El Niño will intensify before peaking in December and is nearly 100% certain to last until February ​2027, the World Meteorological Organization said in its monthly climate bulletin, opens new tab ‌on Thursday, with sea surface temperatures set to break records.

"WMO forecasts indicate a near-100% likelihood that (El Niño) will persist through February 2027, potentially being one ​of the strongest since at least 1950," WMO Secretary General ​Celeste Saulo said in a statement released with the bulletin.

The UN ⁠weather body said sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern ​tropical Pacific, the region at the heart of El Niño phenomenon, ​were expected to reach a record 3.7 degrees Celsius (6.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above normal from October to December.

The forecast temperature anomaly is significantly higher than the previous ​record of 2.6C from November 2015 to January 2016, it said.

"The ​ocean it's drawing from is the warmest we've ever measured it. There is ‌simply ⁠more heat available to release," Saulo said.

El Niño is the warm phase of the naturally occurring El Niño-Southern Oscillation cycle, a climate pattern that influences weather around the world.

It tends to cause higher ​global temperatures and disrupt ​rainfall patterns ⁠across large regions – meaning drought in some areas and heavy rains in others and typically occurs every two ​to seven years.

Mean global temperatures in August reached ​16.96C, tying ⁠with July 2023 as the hottest month on record, according to the European Union's Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Researchers at the University of Chicago's Climate ⁠Impact ​Lab predicted last month that this year's "super-El ​Niño" was likely to result in as many as 451,000 excess deaths across the globe ​from June to February 2027.

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