eli5: Causes and effects of El Niño

Question

I’m trying to make a list of the causes, beginning with the Walker cell, but I can’t seem to grasp wtf is happening??

In: 2

Answer 1

The term El Niño (Spanish for ‘the Christ Child’) refers to a warming of the ocean surface, or above-average sea surface temperatures, in the central and eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. The low-level surface winds, which normally blow from east to west along the equator (“easterly winds”), instead weaken or, in some cases, start blowing the other direction (from west to east or “westerly winds”). El Niño recurs irregularly, from two years to a decade, and no two events are exactly alike. El Niño events can disrupt normal weather patterns in the United States and globally.