Tiny. I believe cold waters are PULLED up by winds blowing offshore dragging warm surface waters with them which are replaced by upwelling cold waters.

This started sub surface. It might not be cooling as such but a failure to warm as per normal, which would look like cooling, but it's such a tight column.

What might have happened is that the anomaly was off the line of the chart and a shift in north or south currents pushed the cold into view. I've only got links to the sub surface patterns along that latitude, so I don't know what the other areas are doing. The surface doesn't seem to show anything weird. If it was off the chart, is it the remainder of last years La Nina or a new feature?

I do think that heat can be dragged down and cold pushed up. I cant think of any other way that El Nino and La Nina happen.

Now I haven't a clue.

Mar 18, 2018 at 1:10 PM | TinyCO2

If only Climate Scientists had such honesty, they wouldn't keep trying to force manipulated data to match failed theories.

I get the idea of warm water welling up, and/or rising over colder currents, and have seen turbulent water in non-lunar tidal areas of the Mediterranean (Straits of Messina) caused by rapid changes of barometric pressure in narrow channels etc.

This is surely an upwelling of cold, rather than rapid heat loss at the surface? If cold can rise, Trenberth will hail this as unprecedented proof of heat diving to the ocean bottom, and hiding!

gc, I've not seen it before but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened. I started looking at the ocean heat about 10 years ago, just after the last serious La Nina, but each time I watched a site, the thing would run for a couple of years and then stop. So I've then had to find another and they portray the data differently. I've never seen a big La Nina born and started watching just after the last big one peaked. Things can change quite quickly but over weeks, not from one half weekly plot to the next. If the plume had been warm, you'd think there was an underwater eruption. I've looked at the winds in the area and they don't look odd. Usually you can see what the Pacific is going to do at the back end of the previous year. By March, the Pacific has usually made up it's mind and will at most go neutral from a prevailing position or the other way. I've never seen an about face. Last year's La Nina was obviously going to be weedy from about 6 months before. This year it looked like a modest El Nino was in the offing. Now I haven't a clue.

Mar 18, 2018 at 11:01 AM | tomo

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/03/17/ruling-climate-fanatics-obliterated-in-aussie-state-election/

Mar 18, 2018 at 11:02 AM | Unregistered Commenter TinyCO2

Is this Unprecedented, because no one has noticed it happening before?