What is an El Niño, and why do atmospheric changes and shifting trade winds tens of thousands of kilometres away affect weather patterns in India? Dr. Roxy Mathew Koll, climate scientist at Pune’s Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, talks to Aathira Perinchery @The Wire about the El Niño, how it can alter weather patterns, and how climate change as well as local and regional land use changes including deforestation can aggravate the impacts of an El Niño.

Adaptation and mitigation efforts are crucial, for they can prepare for an El Niño in advance, Dr. Koll says.

“About 90% of the heat produced by global warming has been absorbed by oceans…if I were to give an analogy, the amount of heat being absorbed by the ocean every second is equivalent to the heat produced by seven Hiroshima atomic bombs,” Dr. Koll says.

July 2026