The power of La Niña

How can any country prepare for such weather patterns? The flooding here in Australia is equivalent to several European countries all under water--and the "inland Tsunami" here in Toowoomba started, destroyed the city centre, killed people, then disappeared in less than two hours. Toowoomba is a city that "never" floods so how could we be more prepared?

I've never been affected by a La Nina, but as a native Californian I like to have drowned in any number of El Nino events. No one outside the meterological and climatology fields ever heard of El Nino until the early 1980's, with La Nina not far behind.

These events have been growing stronger as time goes by. All anyone who is skeptical about climate change has to do is to look back at how these events have grown stonger and stronger over the past 30 years--and beware of what these events will bring in the future!!

"El Niño" means "the little boy", and it refers to the baby Jesus, because the phenomenon tends to occur at Christmas time. It's ridiculous to call the opposite phenomenon "La Niña". What little girl does it refer to?

If climatologists have any forecasts, it would be good to hear from them what parts of the globe are likely to suffer from climate patterns contrary to those they have been used to for the people to prepare themselves for the unexpected. Thank you. Marija Liudvika Rutkauskaite

Either it’s El Nina or El Nino, no one is in need to hear it from scientists that the world in witnessing severe effects of climate change. Morocco has been suffering some flooding these latest 3 years with not too much damage but it remains unusual in a place in the world where flooding has never been common, and the future remains unpredictable.

Weather (and other natural, destructive events) will likely continue to be relatively unpredictable in the long term. Most weather-related deaths occur by drowning and second most by lightning, both of which can be avoided by moving to a more protected location when they threaten. What astonishes me is that it is perfectly obvious folks need clean water, food, warm shelters, and medicines. Not all threats are complex and controversial like global warming! Said supplies needn’t be overly sophisticated and can be easily stockpiled. Topographic maps and common sense suggest high places near major population centers as ideal storage areas. And yet, this isn’t routinely done. I don’t intend here to castigate governmental folks specifically. Ordinary people could do much better than they do looking to their own needs. Once again, a few millennia after the Greeks personified the concept in Prometheus; too few people have mastered the art of forethought. If food and safe shelter were also available, people could be sit around and have a sing-along. Wouldn’t this be preferable to digging graves?
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We've heard a lot about the flooding in Australia, Sri Lanka & Brazil in recent days. But what about the flooding in Colombia, the worst they've ever had, where over 300 people have died and over 2 million have been displaced?

#3 J_D_Crutchfield
Thank you. El Nino was designated as it came near Christmas time.
La Nina was a Media creation as they wanted to be politically correct. God forbid there be gender inequality.

No sooner we are informed of some disaster, another one happens soon after. In my opinion there have never been so many various disasters in one year as has been for the past year to date. Unless we can find the root causes and do something about it, we will continue and expect worse to come. Wether its caused by El Nino or La Nina is debateable, there are several other possible causes, population explosion, polution of our atmosphere, our advanced technology which may be creating disturbances in our atmosphere and others.

Though I live on the east coast of the US, I remember the first discussion of el Nino on the west coast, and then felt its effects on my side of the continent with violent, changed weather patterns. It was at least a decade after this that I first heard of el Nina. My point? "Back then" we were locked in our individual worlds informed, after the fact, by experts in magazines and TV. Today, the entire world is "in our back yard" via the Internet's now-time connection. If nothing else, we can appreciate the meteorologist's difficulty for predicting anything accurately when the "els" huge forces combine to impact all of us. Taken further, we can locate buildings only on high ground, though this does put a severe crimp on trade and economic development. Taken further still, we can postulate cause and effect, and focus investment on new technologies that can better "explain" and predict. Beyond this, we have to accept that our Earth supports life because it is dynamic... which makes being proactive against natural disasters neigh unto impossible.

Here in the US and where I live in Kentucky, we are having a winter with constant snow on the ground since November. We haven't had one of these since 1978. We usually have 3 or 4 good snow storms over the winter but then it warms up and melts. Some regions in the south had large snow falls that they are not used to seeing. I agree with Gary in Indiana that we don't alway prepare, or don't pay attention to new reports to know danger is coming. Just like Australia, Nashville, TN had flooding in areas that have never been flooded before and the river went up into the city. I think all cities and town need disaster plans. Somethings cannot be prepared for (like a wall of water in Australia) but a plan for recovery and rescue if this happens.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

I don't understand why my previous comment was not posted for being off-topic, whilst the comment that prompted it was posted, even though it was also off-topic. I thought it was rejected for being sarcastic, and maybe a little mean. In any case, I think it is becoming harder to get prepared for the usual inclement weather because it seems to be changing, so you now have to be prepared for anything. We just don't know what La mujer, El perro, El gato, or El pajaro are going to look like.

I beseech the commentators - please please please don't confuse "weather" with "climate." The words are not interchangable.

I'm curious if celebrities/politicians etc are blaming the politicians in Brazil and Australia for these natural disasters?I remember that during Hurrican Katrina, basically Bush was blamed for it, and the high number of deaths due to it was attributed to "George Bush doesn't care about black people" by Kanye West.

Has this been politicized in those countries?

@ #14 Mers in Oregon
Weather=Climate=Weather.
Al Gore made them mean the same.

It seems odd, usually we hear of tragedies to poor third world peoples and think of the developed nations as enlightened and prepared to prevent tragedies and take care of themselves after some natural weirdness. But now we're finding that nature overpowers even the most modern and "civilized" nations.

Nature bats last and apparently she follows rules that she hasn't let us humans know about yet in this game of life.

My thoughts to you and yours, Bob Howes in Australia!

Perfect cause and effect: Sunspots are at there lowest in over 100 years and have been low now for 3.5 years, this weather La Nina is not at all surprising, and was predictable to anyone watching the sun. http://www.solarcycle24.com/graphs/sunspotgraph.gif
Sunspots and climate are one of the oldest relationships Economics/ Astronomy has :it this thought that food prices follow the sunspot count- they have done for 400 years. Are food prices high?? The engine of the La nina is the sun. Don't forget the record breaking cold winter elsewhere and everywhere - it all fits.
BBC, please report the sun, and please report the CERN 'CLOUD experiment' - End the silence. The sun is perdicted to be quiet for decades. The warm days are over. Now, until the spots come back it will be wet and cold: where-ever it rains, it will flood.
Essential viewing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpDDqGqN16s