Map displaying global sea surface temperatures on the 29th of October 2023. The colours on the map indicate how much the monthly sea surface temperature differs from the long-term average (1985-1993). The red areas indicate warmer-than-average temperatures, while the blue areas indicate cooler-than-average temperatures. The darker the colour, the more significant the difference from the long-term average. White and very light areas indicate near-average temperatures. The above-average sea surface temperature off the western coast of South America (dark red) is one of the indicators of El Nino conditions, which is the warm phase of a major climate pattern called the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Though every ENSO cycle is different, El Nino tends to increase global temperatures an average of 0.2 degrees Celsius. However, this cycle is occurring in the context of an already very warm global ocean and scientists do not yet know how this will affect El Ninos atmospheric conditions. Data obtained from Multi-scale Ultra-high Resolution (MUR) Sea Surface Temperature (SST) Analysis.