Forecasters predict wildfires, floods, severe heatwaves from incoming El Niño
Forecasters predict wildfires, floods, severe heatwaves from incoming El Niño
气象预报预测：厄尔尼诺现象将引发野火、洪水及极端热浪
Scientists said this week that a developing El Niño is likely to amplify heatwaves, droughts and floods this year, but warned that the long-term warming caused by burning fossil fuels remains the main driver of climate extremes. 科学家本周表示，正在形成的厄尔尼诺现象（El Niño）可能会在今年加剧热浪、干旱和洪水，但他们同时警告称，由燃烧化石燃料引起的长期变暖仍然是极端气候的主要驱动因素。
El Niño is the warm phase of a semi-regular temperature oscillation in the tropical Pacific Ocean, during which massive amounts of heat stored in the ocean are released into the atmosphere, temporarily raising the average annual global surface temperature by as much as 0.3 degrees Fahrenheit. 厄尔尼诺现象是热带太平洋地区一种半规律性温度振荡的暖相位。在此期间，储存在海洋中的大量热量被释放到大气中，使全球年平均地表温度暂时升高多达0.3华氏度（约0.17摄氏度）。
During an online briefing this week, researchers said that the consequences of a moderate or strong El Niño today are more damaging than those of similar events just a few decades ago because the entire global climate system is now substantially warmer. 在本周的一次在线简报会上，研究人员指出，如今中度或强厄尔尼诺现象造成的后果比几十年前类似的事件更具破坏性，因为整个全球气候系统现在已经显著变暖。
If the projected El Niño emerges on top of that warmer climate, there is a “serious risk of unprecedented weather extremes” that would not have happened during similar historical El Niños, said Fredi Otto, a professor in climate science at Imperial College London and a lead researcher with World Weather Attribution, a research group assessing how global warming affects climate extremes. 伦敦帝国理工学院气候科学教授、负责评估全球变暖如何影响极端气候的研究小组“世界天气归因”（World Weather Attribution）首席研究员弗雷迪·奥托（Fredi Otto）表示，如果预期的厄尔尼诺现象叠加在这一变暖的气候之上，将存在“发生前所未有的极端天气的严重风险”，而这些天气在历史上类似的厄尔尼诺时期本不会发生。
El Niño conditions in 2015–2016 and 2023–2024 helped boost Earth’s long-running fever to new records; climatologists expect another spike in the months ahead. But the planet’s temperature will keep reaching new record highs in any case “because of human-induced climate change,” Otto said during the press conference. 2015-2016年和2023-2024年的厄尔尼诺条件助推了地球长期以来的“发烧”状态，创下新纪录；气候学家预计未来几个月气温将再次飙升。但奥托在新闻发布会上表示，无论如何，由于“人类引起的气候变化”，地球温度将持续刷新历史新高。
World Weather Attribution has assessed the effects of global warming on more than 100 extreme climate events since 2014. Often, she said, those studies try to isolate El Niño’s role in a particular extreme event to accurately measure the effect of human-caused warming. In almost every case, the WWA researchers found “human-induced climate change has a much greater influence on the likelihood and intensity of extreme weather events” than El Niño cycles, she said. 自2014年以来，“世界天气归因”组织已经评估了全球变暖对100多起极端气候事件的影响。她说，这些研究通常试图将厄尔尼诺现象在特定极端事件中的作用剥离出来，以准确衡量人为变暖的影响。她表示，在几乎所有案例中，研究人员都发现“人类引起的气候变化对极端天气事件发生的可能性和强度的影响，远大于厄尔尼诺周期”。
One of their assessments showed that human-caused warming “far eclipsed” the effects of a strong El Niño on extreme rains in the Horn of Africa at the end of 2023. 他们的一项评估显示，在2023年底非洲之角的极端降雨事件中，人为变暖的影响“远远超过”了强厄尔尼诺现象的影响。
Jemilah Mahmood, director of the Sunway Centre for Planetary Health at Sunway University in Indonesia, said during the press conference that the scientific projections for serious climate impacts from a combination of long-term warming and El Niño this year can be measured in terms of life and death, especially regarding extreme heat. 印度尼西亚双威大学双威行星健康中心主任杰米拉·马哈茂德（Jemilah Mahmood）在新闻发布会上表示，今年长期变暖与厄尔尼诺现象叠加所带来的严重气候影响，其科学预测可以用生死攸关来衡量，特别是在极端高温方面。
“Heat is exactly the kind of crisis that our systems are designed to ignore until it’s too late,” Mahmood said. “It doesn’t arrive with a named storm or a visible floodline. It kills quietly, in homes, in open fields, in the bodies of workers who have no choice but to be outside,” she said, tallying grim statistics like the estimated 546,000 total annual heat-related global deaths. “We have normalized a public health emergency by failing to name it as one,” she said. “Those who contributed the least to this crisis are often those paying the highest health costs, but that is the equity scandal at the heart of everything we are discussing today.” “高温正是那种我们的系统往往会选择忽视，直到为时已晚的危机，”马哈茂德说。“它不会像命名风暴或可见的洪水线那样到来。它在悄无声息中夺走生命——在家里、在开阔的田野里、在那些别无选择只能在户外工作的劳动者身上，”她列举了严峻的统计数据，例如全球每年估计有54.6万人死于高温相关原因。“我们未能将这一公共卫生紧急状况正名，从而使其常态化了，”她说。“那些对这场危机贡献最小的人，往往是付出最高健康代价的人，这正是我们今天讨论的核心问题中的公平丑闻。”
“Severe year” for wildfires
野火的“严峻之年”
Hotspots at the confluence of El Niño-driven droughts and ongoing planetary heating are expected in wildfire-prone regions, including the Amazon, Canada, the western United States, and Australia, the researchers said during the briefing. 研究人员在简报会上表示，在亚马逊地区、加拿大、美国西部和澳大利亚等易发生野火的地区，厄尔尼诺驱动的干旱与持续的全球变暖交汇，预计将形成火灾热点。
Theodore Keeping, a wildfire researcher at the University of Reading in England, said firefighters in those regions are bracing for a severe year, potentially facing some of the most damaging fire conditions seen in recent history. He noted that the combination of El Niño on top of ongoing warming has driven a “whiplash” between extreme moisture and extreme drought in some regions. Grasses and brush thrive during heavy rains, then dry out quickly when the heat returns, turning into combustible fuel. 英国雷丁大学的野火研究员西奥多·基平（Theodore Keeping）表示，这些地区的消防员正准备迎接严峻的一年，可能面临近期历史上最具破坏性的火灾条件。他指出，厄尔尼诺现象叠加在持续变暖之上，导致一些地区在极端潮湿和极端干旱之间出现“剧烈震荡”。草木在暴雨期间茂盛生长，随后在高温回归时迅速干枯，变成易燃燃料。
This year, Keeping said, wildfires on several continents have already scorched an Alaska-sized area of land—more than half a million square miles—50 percent more than average over the past 25 years. Almost all countries in West Africa and the Sahel region of North-Central Africa experienced record-breaking wildfires, he added. 基平说，今年几个大洲的野火已经烧毁了相当于阿拉斯加面积的土地——超过50万平方英里——比过去25年的平均水平高出50%。他补充说，西非和中北非萨赫勒地区几乎所有国家都经历了破纪录的野火。
But wildfire season is only beginning in many parts of the world, so with “this rapid start, in combination with the forecast El Niño … we’re looking at a particularly severe year materializing,” he said. 但世界许多地方的野火季节才刚刚开始，因此，“这种迅速的开端，再加上预报中的厄尔尼诺现象……我们正面临一个特别严峻的年份，”他说。
Big fires that burned in “normally lusher regions” of East Asia, including Myanmar, Thailand and Laos, were associated with severe droughts that were, in turn, linked with human-caused climate change, he said. Scientists know that ecosystems are drying more rapidly during periods of low rainfall due to warming, he said, adding that “these fires are of particular concern, given how populated the region is.” 他说，在东亚“通常较湿润地区”（包括缅甸、泰国和老挝）燃烧的大火，与严重的干旱有关，而干旱又与人为引起的气候变化有关。他说，科学家们知道，由于变暖，生态系统在降雨量少的时期干燥得更快，并补充说：“考虑到该地区人口稠密，这些火灾尤其令人担忧。”
Keeping said that a strong El Niño “can have a major effect on wildfire risk” appearing later this year, which could increase the likelihood of severe hot and dry conditions in Australia, as well as the northwestern US and Canada, and the Amazon rainforest. 基平表示，强厄尔尼诺现象“可能对今年晚些时候出现的野火风险产生重大影响”，这可能会增加澳大利亚、美国西北部、加拿大以及亚马逊雨林出现严重高温干旱条件的可能性。
Even if El Niño leads to “very extreme conditions later this year, it’s not a reason to freak out,” Otto said. “It comes and goes. Climate change, by contrast, gets worse and worse and worse as long as we do not stop burning fossil fuels. So climate change is the reason to freak out.” “即使厄尔尼诺现象导致今年晚些时候出现‘非常极端的情况’，也不必惊慌，”奥托说。“它来来去去。相比之下，只要我们不停止燃烧化石燃料，气候变化就会变得越来越糟。所以，气候变化才是真正值得惊慌的原因。”
A constructive response, she said, is within reach, “because we do know what to do about it. We have the knowledge and the technology to go very, very far away from using fossil fuels.” 她说，建设性的应对措施是触手可及的，“因为我们确实知道该怎么做。我们拥有摆脱化石燃料所需的知识和技术。”