NASA is tracking what could be the strongest El Niño since 1950. As of October, NOAA puts the odds at 83%.
How it built
- The first clue showed up in January 2026: a Kelvin wave, a slow pulse of warm water thousands of miles long, near Micronesia in the western Pacific.
- Those waves carry heat west to east, warming the air above, weakening or reversing the trade winds and raising sea levels in the eastern Pacific, which feeds the cycle.
- By early April the Kelvin waves had pushed across the Pacific, and NASA’s satellites have been mapping sea surface height and temperature since.
Farmers, firefighters and coastal communities are already feeling it as rain patterns get scrambled around the world.
My take
I love that we can watch a climate pattern build from orbit months before it hits. If you live somewhere El Niño affects (Texas included), it’s worth following NASA’s maps this winter.
