Brian Dunbar

NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C.

September
28, 1994
(Phone: 202/358-1547)

Mary Hardin
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
(Phone: 818/354-5011)

RELEASE: 94-162

TOPEX/POSEIDON CHARTS LONG TERM EL NINO INFLUENCE ON

CLIMATE

More than a decade after affecting climate on a global scale,

residual signs of a powerful El Nino are still visible from space.

Oceanographers using data from the U.S.-French TOPEX/POSEIDON

satellite are tracking the remnant wave of the 1982-83 El Nino event
as it moves across the Northwest Pacific Ocean, where some scientists
theorize it may still be affecting weather in the region.

El Nino is a climatic phenomenon that can bring devastating

weather to several global regions, including heavy rains and flooding
to California, colder than normal winters across the United States and
severe droughts and dust storms to Australia.

"The fact that we are seeing this wave 10 years later is an

amazing discovery in and of itself," said Dr. Gregg Jacobs of the
Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) facility located at the Stennis Space
Center, Mississippi. "The ability to observe changes in global ocean
circulation as we have seen over the Kuroshio region is a
demonstration that the TOPEX/POSEIDON satellite is the most valuable
global ocean observing tool we have. We wouldn't have been able to do
this work without TOPEX/POSEIDON," Jacobs continued.

An El Nino begins when warm water builds up in the equatorial

Pacific and moves eastward toward the coast of the Americas. When
this movement, called a Kelvin wave, reaches the coastline, it is
"reflected" and moves back across the Pacific in the form of a Rossby
wave that continues to affect climate and ocean circulation. The
1982-83 El Nino was the worst such event this century, and its effects
were felt around the world.
 NRL oceanographers noticed the Rossby wave produced by the
1982-83 El Nino while they were studying TOPEX/POSEIDON
ocean-circulation data of the Kuroshio current off the coast of Japan.

"The TOPEX/POSEIDON data showed the Kuroshio current farther

north than it has been observed in earlier data sets," said Jacobs.
"While we were investigating this intriguing change, we discovered the
Rossby wave was actually pushing the current northward, raising the
temperature of the
northwest Pacific."

TOPEX/POSEIDON, a joint program of NASA and the Centre

Nationale d'Etudes Spatiales, the French space agency, uses a radar
altimeter to precisely measure sea-surface height. Scientists use the
TOPEX/POSEIDON data to produce global maps of ocean circulation, which
can be used to identify Kelvin and Rossby waves.

TOPEX/POSEIDON is part of NASA's Mission to Planet Earth, a

coordinated, long-term research program to study the Earth as a single
global environment. TOPEX/POSEIDON's sea-surface height data are
essential to understanding the role oceans play in regulating global
climate, one of the least understood areas of climate research.

The TOPEX/POSEIDON data will enable oceanographers to monitor

the movement of other Rossby waves initiated by El Nino events during
the past decade. The El Ninos of 1986-87 and 1991-93 have produced
Rossby waves that are now propagating across the Pacific Ocean. With
continued observations from TOPEX/POSEIDON, oceanographers will be
able to study the development and impact of these waves.

"As we now know, these waves are capable of producing

dramatic changes in climate, and TOPEX/POSEIDON provides the key to
watching for these changes and allowing us to prepare for them,"
Jacobs said.

While oceanographers still can't predict exactly when an El

Nino event will occur, the TOPEX/POSEIDON data do give them several
months warning before the onset of a new event.

"And unlike El Nino events, Rossby waves are much more

predictable," according to Jacobs. "Given the year of an El Nino, we
know exactly when the Rossby wave's effects will be felt on the
opposite side of the Pacific Ocean.

"As the world's population grows, humanity becomes more

dependent upon reliable resources. Interruptions such as El Nino are
made more devastating by their sudden, unforeseen appearance. The
monitoring and understanding of the world's oceans provided by
TOPEX/POSEIDON helps mitigate the possible disastrous consequences of
what is Earth's nature cycle."

JPL manages the NASA portion of TOPEX/POSEIDON. Launched

Aug. 10, 1992, the satellite has completed two years of its three-year
prime mission and has provided oceanographers with unprecedented
global sea level measurements that are accurate to less than 5
centimeters (2 inches).

- end -

NOTE TO EDITORS: A black-and-white line graphic illustrating the

development of the El Nino current is available on-line via the World
Wide Web system from JPL's home page at the address,
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/ under the "News flash" heading, or by
anonymous file transfer protocol (ftp) from jplinfo.jpl.nasa.gov in
the "News" directory as filename tpxnino.gif.

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