No signs yet of next El Nino, says BMG
Fitri Wulandari, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The National Meteorology and Geophysics Agency (BMG) said on Saturday that it had yet to see any signs that El Nino, the weather phenomenon known to cause devastating floods and droughts, will return to the country this year.
Achmad Zakir, chief of BMG's forecast and service subdivision, said his office had not recorded warmer water in the eastern part of the Pacific Ocean, which is one of the early signs of El Nino.
"For Indonesia, we have observed that the sea surface temperature is rising and remains unstable. It is too early to say, however, whether El Nino is coming or not," he said.
However, Achmad did not rule out the possible return of El Nino.
He said heavy downpours, caused by the warming of the sea surface, were also early signs of El Nino.
Although most parts of Indonesia have been hit by torrential rain in recent weeks, causing floods and landslides in some areas, Achmad said it was not a sign that El Nino will return.
He said the amount of rainfall was returning to normal.
Achmad further said El Nino would come when air pressure in Darwin, Australia, is recorded to be higher than in Tahiti, located at the other end of the Pacific Ocean. "We haven't detected this either," he said.
He said the BMG would continue to closely monitor any sign of the weather phenomenon. "We will be able to predict the possible return of El Nino in March at the very latest," Achmad said.
U.S. forecasters at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) released a report on Thursday, which claimed that El Nino is likely to return in the spring of this year.
Unable to say if the impending El Nino will be as severe as in 1997, they warned tropical Pacific countries, including Indonesia, to be alert against scorching drought.
"Indonesia is likely to realize some relief from torrential rains," said Vernon Kousky, a climate specialist with the NOAA.
El Nino, meaning boy in Spanish, is an abnormal warming of waters in the eastern Pacific Ocean. It changes global winds and rain patterns, and usually happens once every two to seven years, causing storms, droughts, floods and crop failures.
The last El Nino, which lasted from 1997 to 1998, was considered extreme as it caused prolonged droughts in Australia, Indonesia and the Philippines, as well as floods in Peru and Ecuador.
At least 300,000 hectares of forest in Sumatra and Kalimantan caught fire and this was partly attributed to El Nino. The fires resulted in an environmental disaster that sent smoky haze to neighboring countries, in particular Malaysia.
Crop failures, stemming from El Nino in 1997, prompted a food crisis in many parts of Indonesia, including Irian Jaya, where around 300 locals in remote districts of Jayawijaya and Merauke died from starvation.