Australia: The Land Where Time Began

A biography of the Australian continent 

Ningaloo Niño Related to a Rainfall Predictability Interdecadal Regime Shift in the 1990s

According to Doi et al. the coastal ocean off Western Australia began to be influenced by global warming and the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO) which led to a dramatic change in the predictability of the regional climate. After the late 1990s the warmer ocean began driving variability of rainfall regionally. As a result of this the predictability of rainfall near the coastal region of Western Australia on a seasonal time scale was dramatically enhanced in the late 1990s; after the late 1990s it became significantly predictable 5 months ahead. Doi et al. suggest the high rainfall prediction skill in recent decades is very encouraging and would help in the development of an early warning system of the Ningaloo Niño/Niña events which would possibly mitigate societal and agricultural impacts in the granary of Western Australia.

Sources & Further reading

1. Doi, T., S. K. Behera and T. Yamagata (2015). "An interdecadal regime shift in rainfall predictability related to the Ningaloo Niño in the late 1990s." Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans 120(2): 1388-1396.