KUALA LUMPUR: The impact of the El Nino weather phenomenon, which can cause the weather to be hotter and drier, is expected to reduce rainfall in the country during the monsoon season and prevent extreme floods.
Meteorological Department director-general Datuk Che Gayah Ismail said it was anticipated the monsoon season would be prolonged up to 190 days if the phenomenon hit the country.
“This can give an effect on the flood season that frequently hit the country, especially in the East Coast area starting from November to January every year,” she told Bernama here recently.
She said the normal span of the monsoon season was 130 days, whereby, heavy rain would cause the occurence of big floods annually.
On the El Nino phenomenon, she said this hot and dry weather could occur for as long as 18 months.
In identifying such a phenomenon, Che Gayah said, the Meteorological Department needed a period of five months to analyse the rise in temperature in the central and east Pacific Ocean.
“El Nino will be identified when the temperature in the ocean exceeds 37.5 degree celsius for five months consecutively, with an increase of 0.5 degree celsius every month.
“If our country is affected by the El Nino, it is likely that its intensity is weak but 60 per cent of the forecast anticipated a hot and dry weather,” she said. — Bernama