La Niña and El Niño animations Where are animations of La Niña and El Niño events?
If you have an MPEG animation viewer, and sufficient memory, you can view an animation which shows the changes in monthly sea surface temperature in the tropical Pacific Ocean. A Java animation is also available. Notice the weak La Niña peaking in December 1995, and the strong El Niño building in 1997. The animation is about 1 Megabyte in size. As you view this animation, you will see a weak La Niña peaking in December 1995. The bottom panel in the animation, labeled anomalies, shows how much the sea surface temperature for each month is different from the long term average for that month. The green color in the anomalies plot indicates that the temperature of the water is slightly cooler than is normal for that month. A strong El Niño is shown by the warm water spreading from the western Pacific to the eastern Pacific during 1997. The red color in the anomalies plot indicates that the temperature of the water is much warmer than is normal for that month.
