Chinese Scientists Warn of Imminent El Nino

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, March 30, 2002

Chinese Scientists Warn of Imminent El Nino

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El Nino, an abnormal and usually disastrous weather pattern in the Pacific Ocean, is likely to occur in April or May this year, possibly quite soon, warned China's national center for oceanographic forecasting Friday.

The prediction was based on surveys of the Pacific ocean and solar movements, said Song Xuejia, a chief scientist at the center,and he warned that El Nino may occur three times from now to 2008.

El Nino occurs at intervals of several years, bringing drought and causing fires in some parts of the globe and heavier rainfall in others. Its last visit in 1997 brought abnormal weather changesglobally and caused grave economic losses to many countries.

It also brought China droughts and high temperatures in the northern areas while south China had very severe floods from 1997 to 1998.

Monitoring conducted by the National Meteorological Center (NMC)since last November showed that the warm ocean currents of the central Pacific on the Equator are moving eastward, which leads toa rapid increase in the surface temperature of the eastern Pacific,usually considered key signals of El Nino's coming.

Song Xuejia also predicted that this year China would see tide surges higher than last year, especially along its eastern and southeastern coast. But huge waves will not hit the country as frequently as last year and harbors in north China will possibly not be frozen so heavily as last year.

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