An intensifying El Nino broke a temperature record in a key zone of the Pacific in September, the EU’s climate monitor said on Monday (October 12, 2026), in another sign the weather pattern is gaining exceptional strength.
The warming phase of a natural climate cycle, El Nino raises sea temperatures in the tropical Pacific, triggering changes in weather that can increase the risk of drought and flooding, and exacerbate man-made global warming. As climate change raises ocean temperatures, it can make recent El Nino events appear stronger than past ones, complicating historical comparisons. El Nino warms surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean, bringing worldwide changes in winds, pressure and rainfall patterns.
The Copernicus Climate Change Service said sea surface temperatures in a tell-tale El Nino monitoring region of the Pacific, known as Nino3.4, had reached an “all-time high” of 29.70C last month. On Friday, Japan’s weather agency said that El Nino conditions had reached their “strongest intensity on record”, with temperatures in the phenomenon’s monitoring area 4C above normal. Nations agreed at the 2015 UN climate talks in Paris to keep global warming “well below” 2C above pre-industrial levels, while pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5C, in order to limit the effects of climate change.
