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Experts Predict That El Niño Will Fade Out By Second Quarter Of 2016

By R. Siva Kumar | Update Date: Feb 22, 2016 01:12 PM EST

It is now the peak of the 'El Niño' climate phenomenon that started last year, according to the Daily Mail. The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) explains that El Nino will continue to influence weather conditions globally in the coming months.

El Niño has made global temperatures shoot up to record levels, leading to a number of extreme weather conditions, floods and droughts. This is because the ocean and atmosphere interacted in one part of the Pacific, which takes place just once every two to seven years.

Even though current El Niño has been said to be the strongest thus far, the WMO reports that it is still too early to say whether it will break the record for the strongest ever record.

"We have just witnessed one of the most powerful ever El Nino events which caused extreme weather in countries on all continents and helped fuel record global heat in 2015," said Petteri Taalas, WMO's secretary general. "In meteorological terms, this El Nino is now in decline. But we cannot lower our guard as it is still quite strong and in humanitarian and economic terms, its impacts will continue for many months to come."

It will most likely fade out in the later part of 2016. However, it will leave with a number of lessons for future generations.

"Parts of South America and East Africa are still recovering from torrential rains and flooding," said Talas. "The economic and human toll from drought...is becoming increasingly apparent in southern (Africa) and the Horn of Africa, central America and a number of other regions."

Even though weather patterns such as El Niño are not due to climate change, the rising ocean temperatures due to global warming will impact their intensity and frequency, says Raw Story.

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