El Niño Phenomenon Relation with the Glaciers Retreat in the Andes By Juan Pablo Galarza, Maria Emilia Andrade and Juan Andrés Cajiao

 Did you know that when the ocean temperatures increase like during the El Niño Phenomenon, the glaciers from the Andes are affected too and decrease in area?

Background InformationBackground Information  What is ENSO? -El Niño Southern Oscillation is when ocean temperatures change dramatically and affect places/countries with weather and climate. -La Niña is the contrary of the El Niño, since there are droughts and arid climate. -When this phenomenon occurs, there are changes in water currents, atmospheric pressure and ocean temperatures, especially in the Pacific Ocean. -The easterly trade winds are very important to ENSO, because they push warm water toward the Western Pacific Ocean. Because of this, this area has the warmest ocean temperatures on Earth (28° C or more). -Because all this warm water is pushed towards the western Pacific, the atmosphere above the ocean is heated causing precipitation and conditions of convection.

Background InformationBackground Information  ENSO effects on Glaciers -ENSO has strong impacts on meteorological phenomena that directly or indirectly affect most regions on the planet and their populations. --These records present an opportunity to examine the nature of tropical climate variability in greater detail and to extract new information on linkages between rising temperatures on tropical glaciers and equatorial Pacific sea surface temperatures in critical ENSO indicator regions. -The long-term climate records from a collection of high-altitude tropical ice cores provide the longer-term context essential for assessing the significance of the magnitude and rate of current climate changes that are in large measure driving glacier retreat.

Background InformationBackground Information  Solutions for ENSO -There is no exact solution for the El Niño, because it is a natural climatological phenomenon that cannot be stopped. -What you can do is prepare yourself if you live nearby the Pacific Ocean. You can open drains and keep ditches and other water collection ways clear of leaves and debris. -Prepare emergency provisions. Since electric power may be affected, store up plenty of flashlight batteries and if you are on a well or booster pump, store several gallons of bottled water.

The Antisana´s Glacier Retreat Situation  Antisana volcano is located ’S, 40 km to the east of Quito  Glacier 15 is located between a height of 4820 meters above sea level (masl) and 5760 masl  The glacier is 1883 m long (alpha tongue)  The glacier’s area is 651,701m 2 (year 2004)  From the glacier retreated 0.38m per month (4.56m per year)  From the glacier retreated 1.71m per m (20.52m per year)  The ablation (reduction of mass) of glacier 15 is directly related to ENSO  There are 3 periods of negative balance (or reduction in the mass of glacier 15): 1995, until November, from March 1997 to May 1998, and from April 2001 until 2004  A couple of positive year(increase in the mass of glacier 15) during the cold event of ENSO, better known as La “Niña”, from December 1995 to March 1997 and from July 1998 to February 2001  In 48 years, 22% of the glacier has been lost

Our Math Lab- Linear Relationship  How can the ocean temperatures from the Galápagos Islands Ocean affect the ablation of the glaciers in the Andes?  For the last 7 months of this school year, we have been recording the temperatures of the islands (Western). Afterwards, we created tables, graphs and a best fit line to explain the way how the ocean temperatures affect the decrease of glaciers.  In the following slides you will be able to see what we have done.

Ocean Temperatures Southern Islands y=0.473x y: Average Temperature x: # of Year Average Sea Surface Temperature (SST) for the Galápagos Southern Islands Year# of Year Avg Temp (C°)

Ocean Temperatures Western Islands y = 0.78x y: Average Temperature x: # of Month Average Sea Surface Temperatures for the Galapagos Western Islands Month# of MonthAvg. Temp September October November December January February March725.95

Antisana Glacier 15 AreaAntisana Glacier 15 Area y = -16,804x + 365,464 y: Amount of Area Covered x: # of Years Antisana´s Glacier 15 Retreat Year# of YearArea (m 2 ) , , , , ,207

Calculations for Temperatures  To find the slope: 2 good points on the line: (21.33, 2), (22.89, 4)  To find the y-intercept: = 0.78 (4) a = 3.12 a = a Slope ÷3.12 y-intercept

Conclusions  After all the hard work, we got to the conclusion that this extreme ocean temperatures do actually affect the decrease in glaciers.  As the temperatures increase then the glaciers decrease. The glaciers have a negative slope while the ocean temperatures have a positive slope.  We have realized that the phenomenon of El Niño has a massive effect in climate, ocean temperatures that affect the glaciers in the Andes.  There is a direct relationship (linear) between ENSO and the Sea Surface Temperature (SST) in the eastern Pacific Ocean and glacier ablation in the Ecuadorian cordillera.

References  Global Patterns - El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) | State Climate Office of North Carolina. (n.d.). Retrieved April 29, 2015, from climate.ncsu.edu/climate/patterns/ENSO.htmlhttp:// climate.ncsu.edu/climate/patterns/ENSO.html  KBR: El Niño Preparations. (n.d.). Retrieved April 29, 2015, from  Climate Change and the Oceans. (n.d.). Retrieved April 29, 2015, from te3.html te3.html  /mod_assign/intro/climatechange-9-12.pdf (NASA Packet about ENSO) /mod_assign/intro/climatechange-9-12.pdf

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