El Niño To Intensify Rains in Peru and Ecuador

On Friday, meteorologists warned that the coasts of southern Ecuador and northern Peru are heating up due to the El Niño, which will generate heavy rains for several months.

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Juan Nieto, the director of the International Center for the Investigation of the El Niño Phenomenon (CIIFEN), explained that the warming of the temperature on the Pacific coasts will be "gradual" in the rest of the South American countries.

"El Niño is expected to have a moderate intensity, but this does not mean that its impacts will also be moderate. Everything will depend on each country and area," said Nieto during the 22nd Western South America Climate Forum that takes place in Santiago City, in Chile.

El Niño is the warm phase of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and is associated with a band of warm ocean water that develops in the equatorial Pacific. It mainly affects the South American coasts eventually causing heavy torrential rains.

The tweet reads, "The Guayaquil airport woke up flooded due to heavy rains."

"We recommend that the authorities be in continuous contact with their meteorological services... We recommend taking precautions without waiting for the facts to confirm any bad forecasts," CIIFEN director said.

In recent months, the La Niña phenomenon also appeared in South America, generating an effect contrary to El Niño, namely, cooling of the seas and decreased rainfall, which in turn caused a water deficit in some areas of Chile and Argentina.

At the beginning of March, however, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) officially announced the end of La Niña.