Joel and Jimmy kick off the series with an episode about El Niño, that mysterious shift in warm ocean water that drives the whole planet bonkers every 2(ish) to 7(ish) years. They reflect on tiny changes and big effects, as well as how weather science (and science in general) is often a coin flip; heads is disaster, tails is disappointment.

Introductions

El Niño on Wikipedia

What are El Niño and La Niña? from NOAA. 

Chris Farley's El Niño skit on Saturday Night Live.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration El Niño Portal

The NOAA ENSO Blog

Wunderground's El Niño Blog (A truly excellent blog)

What does El Niño mean for the 2015-2016 Winter by Weather.com

November El Niño update: It’s a small world from climate.gov.

Historical White Christmas Chances

Weatherbell.com - a truly excellent, but premium, weather model products site.

El Niño and the Galápagos from climate.gov (we forgot to talk about this in the show, but there is some very cool information here. Check it out).

By one measure, this wicked El Niño is the strongest ever recorded: What it means by Capital Weather Gang (Check out the video in this post - only takes about 3 minutes to watch but does a very good job of giving you a quick, high level explanation of El Niño).

Is the near-record El Niño already chipping away at the California, western drought? by Capital Wearther Gang

This remarkably strong El Niño has topped yet another significant record by Capital Weather Gang

Past weather patterns highlight the difference between snow boom or snow bust during a strong El Nino in D.C. by Ian Livingston

Survey photos reveal damage of this year’s global coral bleaching event from climate.gov

US Drought Monitor Website

El Nino brings 2nd venomous sea snake to California beaches from the Oregonian (another item we forgot to cover. Still, cool though so check it out)