El Niño Fires Up the Pacific as Typhoons Pile On Across East Asia

The Pacific is running a fever, and it just set a record. Last month, sea surface temperatures in the equatorial Pacific — the stretch the Japan Meteorological Agency watches for El Niño signals — hit 4C above normal, the hottest reading since records started in 1949. The old mark was 3.6C, set back in December 1997. China's climate agency now warns those waters will keep warming over the next three months.

The damage is already written across East Asia. October's Typhoon Champi packed 295km/h winds — category five equivalent — and briefly shut down almost all of Taiwan, cancelling hundreds of flights in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Japan, closing seaside highways in the Philippines' Batanes islands and cutting power to 15,000 homes in Okinawa. Earlier in the year came Super Typhoon Dolphin, which churned for 16 days before slamming eastern China and leaving dozens dead, plus Tropical Storm Narra in Guangxi and Typhoon Saudel, which hit three south-eastern Chinese cities in a single week.

Then there was June, when Typhoon Mekkhala and Severe Tropical Storm Higos raced at Japan's eastern coast at the same time, forcing a million people to evacuate. August delivered another head-scratcher: Typhoon Chan-Hom crossed Japan from east to west instead of the usual south-to-north track. Japan's well-drilled authorities moved people out fast, though the BBC notes that would be a far tougher ask in some neighbouring countries.

El Niño is a natural climate pattern that shows up every two to seven years and usually sticks around for about a year. This one, forecast by the UK Met Office to be the strongest in living memory, is expected to run until February or March. Heated waters are loading the region with storm energy: the Accumulated Cyclone Energy reading for South East and East Asia is forecast to come in at nearly double the 30-year average, with typhoons forming further east and staying over warm water longer.

Ana Liza Solis, head of climatology at the Philippines' national weather bureau, compared the ocean to a body burning with fever. It can go into convulsions soon, she warned at a briefing in Manila in September, according to the BBC. Climatologist Rafaela Jane Delfino and colleagues simulated warmer conditions against the Philippines' worst storms, including 2013's Super Typhoon Haiyan, which killed more than 6,000 people. Their finding: 26% more accumulated rainfall — very, very scary, she called it.

Governments are scrambling. Japan has told citizens to stockpile food and essentials and tie down anything the wind could turn into a projectile. China wants local officials to map vulnerable areas and is upgrading its warning and monitoring systems. The Philippines and its South East Asian neighbours are bracing for rice shortages and boosting support to farmers, fertiliser included. The UN Development Programme's Asia-Pacific office says the window for governments to act on El Niño is closing.