Maps for Project

View Prevailing Weather conditions of El Nino in a larger map


View La Nina in a larger map


View Queensland Floods (La Nina) in a larger map


View El Nino effect on Victoria Bushfires in a larger map

La Nina

La Nina
La Nina translates into “girl-child’”, which is the opposite to El Nino.La Nina is the cooling season of the tropical regions (Pacific Rim to East Africa and beyond). It occurs every 3-7 years, as well as El Nino. When La Nina strikes, it brings heavy rainfall that can often lead to floods.

The La Nina that appeared in the Pacific in 2010 probably helped last year's south-west monsoon end on the good note. But then again, it also caused one of that country's worst natural disasters with large parts of State of Queensland either under water from floods of unusual proportions or being destroyed by Tropical Cyclones, including that of category 5 Tropical Cyclone Yasi.

Cyclone Yasi and the Queensland Floods

Cyclone Yasi was a frightening storm that struck the east coast of Australia. It brought very violent winds and many storms that brought heavy rain and some flooding. The La Nina weather brought the Monsoonal effect which increased the intensity of the flood. The cyclone was a catagory 5. This is very violent but luckily the people of Queensland were prepared for the furious weather. No-one was killed although millions of dollars was lost when the storm hit banana crops. Millions of dollars was lost when the storm hit and it will take years for the crops to fully grow back.  

Months later, Queensland was struck with yet another storm. This one was also influenced by the La Nina season. It was monsoonal season and rain was expected, but nothing near as much as was was received. $30 Billion dollars was wasted away when Queensland was swept away due to the furious floods. 39 people were killed and 9 are missing. Much of central and southern Queensland including Brisbane, Rockhampton,Emerald, Bundaberg, Dalby,Toowoomba, and Ipswich was flooded. It is currently being re-built with more than 55, 000 volunteers keen to help out a cause than has affected Australian everywhere.

El Nino

El Nino is the heating of the pacific ocean. The sun heats up the pacific ocean (thaste largest ocean) and the warm water is pushed east by strong winds. The water heats up the East Cost  of Australia and West of South America. El Nino affects approximately 25% of the earths surface.

El Nino brings very moist weather. It also takes effect during the Monsoon season, a season with hot weather and heavy rain and storms.

How does it works

Trade winds blow from east (south-west America) to west (East Australia) causing a pile up of warm surface water in the west Pacific so that the sea surface is about 1/2 meter higher at Indonesia than at Ecuador. To replace the water that has been blown to the west, cold nutrient-rich water rises up from the depths along the coast of South America. This nutrient-rich water supports a diversity of marine life, and also supports the fisherman in South America.

    When an El Niño event takes place (every four years or so), these trade winds relax and the water that once "piled up" in the western Pacific, sloshes back towards the west, causing the end of the nutrient-rich upwelled coastal water (and thus a downturn in the fishing industry as well).

    Because of the close coupling of the ocean and the atmosphere, these changes in warm water also brings rainfall. This results in a wide variety of changes in global atmospheric changes, which forces weather changes in regions far removed from the tropical Pacific. For instance, the presence of El Niño reduces the number of hurricanes over in the Atlantic Ocean.

Black Saturday

29 of January, 2009, an arson suspected fire broke out in Delburn. The area is dense in dry forest which makes it a perfect place for a fire. Winds also contribute as to how devastating a bush fire is. If the winds are strong and the direction of the wind is towards a town it is likely the fire will travel in that direction and destroy the town. The winds propelled the fire onwards with some fire balls reaching 120 kmh.The fire took out hundreds of hectares worth of forest. The fire was accelerated by very hot weather and a monsoon season. The fire season was drier and hotter because of the El Nino season. The wind pushed the heated water west and made the air heated which acted at a fuel for fires. It also caused large stormy weather in the monsoon season which triggered lightning storms which also caused some of the Victorian fires. The final repair bill of the Black Saturday Fires was around $5 Billion Australian Dollars.