San Diego has seen what a powerful El Niño can do.
Now, as another unusually strong El Niño develops in the tropical Pacific, the winter of 1997-98 offers a striking reminder of how dramatically the region can change when heavy rain, swollen rivers, saturated hillsides and powerful surf arrive together.
A Sept. 10 outlook published by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) gives El Niño a greater than 90% chance of reaching very strong strength during the Northern Hemisphere fall and winter of 2026-27. NOAA also puts the chance at 75% that the October-through-December period will qualify as a historic-strength event, exceeding the strength of previous El Niño events in the modern record dating to 1950…