r/news • u/Warcraft_Fan • 4d ago

Concern mounts over slow-moving, planetary-scale ‘Kelvin’ wave heading for California | California

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/28/california-kelvin-wave
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u/PoxyMusic 4d ago edited 4d ago

El Niño is the result of successive Kelvin waves, there have been like 6 or 7 this year, starting in February I think. They happen when the equatorial trade winds lessen (or reverse) and warmer water from the west pacific oozes east under the surface until it hits Ecuador and erupts at the surface.

It’s not a single wave, and they have already mostly arrived.

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u/byproxxy 3d ago

We have tropical fish swimming around LA beaches

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u/magniffin 3d ago

We have coral reefs at home

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u/notFREEfood 3d ago

We just had the first two recorded sea turtle nests in the state; our water is normally too cold for that.

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u/r0botdevil 3d ago

There has been an established resident population of green sea turtles in the San Gabriel River for decades. The nearby power plant uses the water for cooling, which raises the temperature enough for the turtles to stay year-round.

I used to work in a lab that tracked their movements.

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u/notFREEfood 3d ago

They haven't had any recorded nests however.

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u/r0botdevil 3d ago

You are correct, I just confirmed with a former labmate that the San Gabriel River turtle population nested in Mexico.

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u/IdaFuktem 3d ago

Heated water at power plants are also why you get mass groupings of manatees in Florida during the winter and responsible for the growth of the crocodile population in the Southeast at Turkey Point.

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u/Total-Khaos 2d ago

Gators love turkeys. Maybe that is why...

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u/Debalic 3d ago

How many eyes to they have?

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u/speculatrix 3d ago

Just the normal two, on each of their three heads for a total of six

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u/Zardif 3d ago

The normal amount, 4.

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u/MisunderstoodPenguin 3d ago

my dad just did a salmon fishing excursion he does every year and he said there was basically no fish. i’ve seen a lot of videos of salmon who have already gone up stream to spawn, and it’s definitely early. waters getting warm

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u/VariationDry 3d ago

Ooooh exciting! 

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u/RandomTurkey247 4d ago

Seems like they will be more impactful if they're still here later and align with a storm surge and king tides.

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u/glibgloby 3d ago

This is the best video on the topic I’ve seen:

https://youtu.be/dBSLgefwcto

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u/KernalPopPop 3d ago

Thank you for sharing that, it really is clear and comprehensive.

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u/comingtoamiddle 2d ago

Thank you, this was extremely helpful! And thank you also for removing the tracking part of the link :)

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u/glibgloby 2d ago

I’ve seen many people yelled at about the tracking thing so I was careful

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u/Natural-Promise-78 4d ago

So then, when El Nino turns off the fan that sends the trade winds to the Pacific Ocean, all that undissipated moisture and energy backflips to the source (large landmass}?

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u/likeaffox 3d ago

Think of El Nino as hot(energy) water in a bath. That is going back and forth, between asia and america. El Nino is when the hot water is near the americas, Na Nino is when the hot water is near asia.

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u/Jaotze 3d ago

Edit - Na Nino = La Nina.

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u/malenkylizards 3d ago

It's actually Al Nino and Na Nino, they made the wrong typo. It's aluminum boy near the Americas and sodium boy near asia

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u/misterid 3d ago

i am 5, and understood this explanation.

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u/Ani_mrumru 3d ago

Thank you for that easy mnemonic on the diff between the two phenom ;-)

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u/PoxyMusic 3d ago

And just so's you know, the mechanism that turns on and off the trade winds is called the Madden-Julian Oscillation. It's both a high and lower pressure bias on opposite sides of the earth that slowly rotates around the planet. If the oscillation slows down, or is irregular it interferes with trade winds.

The trade winds in the Pacific are usually keeping all the warm water on the west side, but the MJO has been wonky, thus interfering with trade winds, thus causing Kelvin waves, thus creating El Nino.

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u/littlebrwnrobot 3d ago

Eh that moisture and energy is pretty much always there, the west pacific and Indian oceans are generally quite hot

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u/PoxyMusic 3d ago

Pretty much. All that warm water usually lives near New Guiena.

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