Overview
- September 2026 set a new monthly global ocean surface temperature record while global surface temperatures were near the second-warmest September on record.
- NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center assessed on October 8 that El Niño is strengthening and gave a near-certain chance of an extremely strong event through December with above 80 percent odds it will persist into February.
- Observed daily sea-surface temperature records and model runs have already shown unusually large anomalies, prompting NOAA to raise the odds this event could be the strongest since 1950.
- El Niño’s shifting atmospheric circulation will change rainfall and storm odds worldwide, raising the risk of drought in some regions, heavier rains and stronger storms in others, and stressing fisheries and coral ecosystems.
- Humanitarian and health warnings are mounting: UNICEF says more than 347 million children live in areas expected to face drier or wetter conditions, and model estimates link the extra warming to hundreds of thousands of excess heat-related deaths as governments prepare emergency measures while attribution work continues.