This’ll probably come as good news to my drought-plagued Australian friends. El Niño’s just about done. For us here in the U.S., the precipitation pattern – dry in Arizona, wet in Seattle – suggests that no teleconnection really got engaged in any sort of a big way, reflective of either how weak it was, or maybe just noise in the system. Dunno.

It’s worth noting that, despite such a weak El Niño, January was bonkers warm globally, according to the NASA Gistemp crew, warmest Earth has ever been, according to their numbers. No doubt Earth timed this to coincide with the release of the IPCC report. Clever planet.