El Nino could be 'strongest in living memory,' warns UK weather agency

'I have never seen an El Nino signal this intense in our forecasts,' says head of long-range forecasting at UK Met Office

The El Nino event developing over the Pacific Ocean is likely to be the "strongest in living memory," the UK Met Office warned Friday, with the phenomenon potentially making 2027 the hottest year on record. The powerful natural climate phenomenon pushes up global temperatures and increases the risk of extreme weather, and, combined with the effects of human-induced climate change, the Met Office has warned that it is "very likely" to make 2027 the hottest year on record globally. "We should be clear that this is an unprecedented event," Adam Scaife, head of long-range forecasting at the UK Met Office, told the BBC. He added: "I have never seen an El Nino signal this intense in our forecasts." Latest forecasts from the Met Office suggest that these temperature anomalies could exceed 3C (5.4F) later this year as El Nino approaches its peak. "We have many months to go while this event continues to develop and that's one of the reasons that we have increased confidence that this will be a record-setting event," said Zeke Hausfather, a climate scientist at Berkeley Earth, a US research group.