El Niño Is Underway

El Niño, defined by warmer-than-normal water in parts of the equatorial Pacific, returned in June 2026. Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich satellite observations that month showed the event continuing to strengthen. NOAA declared an El Niño on June 11 after sea surface temperatures in the central and eastern equatorial Pacific measured at least 0.5 degrees Celsius above average for several consecutive months.

The phenomenon often brings wetter conditions to the U.S. Southwest and drought to countries in the western Pacific, such as Indonesia and Australia. NASA scientists have tracked a complementary signal: elevated sea surface height. Warm water expands and raises the sea surface, so higher-than-normal sea levels are a reliable indicator of ocean heat.

A map of sea surface height anomalies on June 8, 2026, shows red areas where sea level was above average; the data were acquired by Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich—launched in 2020 by NASA and led by ESA—and processed by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

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