What is El Niño, what causes it and can we reduce the risks?

Source: Jonathan Watts, interview with Prof Mat Collins, The Guardian, 26 September 2026

Reviewed: 28 September 2026

Evidence type: secondary reporting and expert interpretation, not a current operational or place-specific forecast.

What the interview contributes

Collins explains how a natural Pacific climate pattern and human-caused warming can compound risks without being the same cause. In this interview, he says the El Niño-region sea-surface temperature had reached 3°C above average, matching the previous 2015 high; 4°C was a trajectory if the trend continued, not a measurement already achieved. He says the event had not peaked and might be exceptionally strong, while stressing that a warming ocean baseline makes comparisons across centuries difficult. Read his answers in context.

Asked about recent UK heat and fires in Europe, Canada and the US, Collins says he does not think this El Niño worsened them: in his assessment they came too soon after its onset. This is not a formal attribution study of each event. He also says relative warmth across the world’s oceans helps shape where rainfall shifts, so a Pacific temperature alone is not a local forecast.

Collins describes a roughly six-to-nine-month forecasting lead time as an opportunity for preparation. He gives examples involving crop choices in Latin America and wildfire defences in south-east Asia. These are examples of using a forecast to ask locally relevant questions, not advice to change crops or infrastructure wherever you live. He emphasizes maintaining Pacific observations and forecasting capacity.

What not to take from it

• “Super” and “godzilla” are attention-catching labels here, not a reliable local warning category.
• A potential record and a possible 4°C anomaly are conditional, not settled observations.
• This interview does not establish who will be affected, when a particular place will see impacts, or whether any named community should adopt a specific action.
• Collins mentions cloud-modification geoengineering as speculative and uncertain; this is not ordinary preparedness advice.

How to use it

Use the interview to distinguish evidence from prediction and to ask what a current local outlook implies for an actual decision. Then consult your meteorological agency and people with local knowledge. See Understanding El Niño and Prepare in your place.

This note is an original summary. The linked article is the source for the scientist’s statements; SENRI has not independently verified the underlying ocean observations or the regional outlooks.