There is an enormous amount of data that proves El Ninos and La Ninas significantly alter the Pacific Ocean’s temperature, influence Earth’s atmospheric temperature, reverse equatorial trade winds, and change our climate.

It may come as a surprise that armed with all this information scientists still don’t know what generates El Ninos and La Ninas.

This article will show that massive amounts of heated fluids, cooled fluids, chemicals, and various gases emitted from seafloor geologic features located at a non-moving/fixed location in a far western part of the Pacific Ocean, i.e., the “Source Point”, generate and maintain both El Ninos and La Ninas.

Source Point
All El Ninos and La Ninas originate in the exact same deep ocean seafloor area which is located east of Papua New Guinea and west of the Solomon Islands (Figure 2). The Source Point covers 150,000 square miles, which is a mere 0.23 percent of the Pacific Ocean’s 64,092,958 square miles.

The Source Point’s area is one of the most geologically active regions on Earth because it is home to the junction of five extremely active major fault systems, the second largest ocean floor lava plateau on Earth, hundreds of ocean floor volcanoes, and a tremendous number of ocean floor hydrothermal vents.

Generation Of El Ninos And La Ninas

When an enormous deep-earth molten lava chamber that is far beneath the Source Point becomes active, it super-pressurizes gases within the lava in the chamber, primarily CO2. The pressurized lava then pushes upward through lower-pressure rock layers eventually spilling out onto the ocean floor where it creates and fuels many types of geological features. This process marks the beginning of an El Nino.
The ocean floor’s geological features then begin emitting massive amounts of extremely hot fluids, chemicals, and gases into the lower ocean layer. However, these emissions don’t increase the temperature of the ocean layer beneath the Source Point area. This is because the temperature of the heated fluids, chemicals, and gases also act to melt massive deposits of vertically and horizontally oriented ice-bearing rock layers—layers generated before the emergence of the lava pocket activity. These layers are typically very thick and stretch for miles away from the Source Point.
It takes a significant amount of time until the emitted heat melts a large portion of the icy rock layers.
Once the icy rock layers melt, the emissions of heated fluids, chemicals, and gases begin to greatly increase the temperature and chemical composition of the ocean water. The heated water gets transported eastward by ocean currents that act to form an immense, heated, three-dimensional area that extends from the Source Point to South America. However, the three-dimensional area still has pockets of cooler water. In time the area completely warms to the same temperature. This is now a fully formed El Nino.
When the activity of the deep-earth lava pocket diminishes, the temperature of the fluids, chemicals, and gases it emits from the lava pocket also decreases. At some point, the decreasing temperature reaches a tipping point that is conducive to reestablishing all the icy rock layers to their original extent. The cool water gets transported eastward by ocean currents that act to form an immense, heated, three-dimensional area that extends from the Source Point to South America. However, the three-dimensional area still has pockets of warmer water. In time, the area becomes completely cooled to the same temperature. This is now a fully formed La Nina.
When the lava chamber becomes totally inactive and no longer emits fluids chemicals or gases, the El Nino and La Nina phases end.

Helium Gas Emitted From The El Nino And La Nina Source Point
Figure 3 is a map showing the concentration of helium gas in seawater across a large portion of the Pacific Ocean. The presence of helium gas plumes is a very strong indicator that the gas was emitted from an erupting volcano.

Note that the source point of the helium plume in Figure 3 perfectly matches the Source Point of the El Nino and La Nina. This is very convincing evidence that the generation of all El Ninos and La Ninas is the result of geological activity.

El Nino Volcanic Eruption Analog
Figure 4 is a photo of volcanic ash being expelled from an erupting land volcano. The fixed source point, “V”-shape pattern of the ash, and its transition from high ash concentration to no ash construction is an analog of an El Nino.

Figure 4. Photo of a volcanic eruption from space taken by NASA’s Endeavour Space Shuttle
(image credit NASA’s Space Shuttle Program, some labeling by J. Kamis).

Three-Dimensional Time-Lapse Video Illustrating An El Nino And A La Nina Generation
Figure 5 is a snapshot of a three-dimensional time-lapse video illustrating that El Nino and La Nina begin at the Source.

The downward-pointing Heat Spikes are formed by emissions from the hot lava pocket. As you watch the video it becomes apparent that both the El Nino and La Nina form in bursts.

Eventually, the cumulative effect of the bursts generates a fully formed El Nino or La Nina.

Figure 5. Development of El Nino warm phase and La Nina cool phase
(Source: YouTube screencap see here). (Some labeling by J. Kamis).

Side Effects Vs Root Cause
Scientists attempting to decipher what force or forces generate and maintain El Ninos and La Ninas use the vast amount of atmospheric and oceanic data to formulate their conclusions.

Utilizing this data scientists have found correlations of trade winds, ocean currents, climate phenomenon, and climate to the formation of El Ninos and La Ninas. it shows these correlations are side effects of geologically induced El Ninos and La Ninas.

This is not to say that all changes in trade winds, ocean currents, climate phenomena, and climate are related to geological forces. Rather, during El Ninos and La Ninas, changes in the above parameters are caused by geological forces.

High-Resolution Mapping Of Earth’s Ocean Floors
Oceans cover 71% of the earth yet the number of geological features present on its ocean floors is not well known primarily due to the lack of high-resolution elevation mapping.

High-resolution elevation mapping is needed to image the limited height and width of ocean floor geological features. It would seem that these small ocean floor features would have little effect on the temperature, chemical composition, amount of CO2 rising into the atmosphere, and amount of methane gas rising into the atmosphere.

The opposite is true.

Modern research studies have concluded that emissions from thousands of small land geological features have an underestimated effect on climate.

A University of Cambridge study concluded that climate models should be updated to include the climate effect of land volcanic activity. They attribute this underestimation to a lack of including the thousands of small land volcanic features.

You may ask how is all this relevant to the generation of El Ninos and La Ninas. The answer is that higher resolution elevation mapping of the ocean floor in the Source Point area will likely find hundreds of heretofore undiscovered active volcanoes and hydrothermal vents. These additional features geological may add credence to the idea that geological activity generates El Nio’s and La Ninas.

The primary source of data that measures the temperature, pressure, and salinity of the upper and middle ocean layers is the ARGO Buoy System.

As of 2015, the ARGO system forms a worldwide network of 3,881 autonomously operating buoys. Each buoy can vary its depth from the ocean surface to 6,562 feet and vary its geographic position.

When the buoys descend to a depth of 6,562 feet, they record their GPS position, ocean floor temperature, ocean floor pressure, and ocean floor salinity, which is then stored in an onboard computer.

When a buoy rises to the surface it transmits its GPS position, ocean floor temperature data, ocean floor pressure data, and ocean floor salinity data to satellites. This data is utilized to construct low-resolution three-dimensional maps of temperature, pressure, and salinity at 6,562 feet. The maps are low resolution for several reasons.

Earth’s oceans cover 139,700,000 square miles, which means there is only one ARGO buoy every 36,000 square miles.

In other words, the ARGO buoys are widely spaced and therefore don’t provide enough data to resolve how geological features are present in our oceans.

The current estimate of how many geological features are present on ocean floors is 3,000,000. Once the elevation of all of Earth’s ocean floors is mapped in high resolution, this estimate will be substantially higher.

Other Evidence That El Ninos And La Ninas Are Generated By Geological Forces

The rare occurrence of three La Ninas in a row termed a Tripple La Nina, occurred from 2020 to 2023. This event was immediately followed by a still-developing El Nino. The amount of energy needed to cool and then maintain the below-average temperature across a huge portion of the Pacific Ocean for three years is immense. A greater amount of energy is required to quickly increase the temperature of a huge portion of the Pacific Ocean into a warm El Nino phase. This large amount of energy can only be supplied by energy emissions from a deep earth molten lava pocket.
The amount of energy needed to generate an El Nino within an ocean floor geologically active area measuring 20 by 30 miles has here been very roughly estimated. The known energy released from a 20 by 30 miles portion of Yellowstone’s Pitchstone volcanic Plateau is roughly the same amount needed to form an El Nino. Interestingly, Yellowstone and the El Nino Source Point are both associated with deep earth molten lava pockets.
El Ninos do not occur in a predictable historical pattern, rather they occur randomly. This is indicative of a geological origin such as volcanic eruptions which are not predictable.
El Nino-like events do not occur elsewhere in the Pacific or other oceans. Why? If they are atmospheric in origin, there should at least be one other El Nino location.
Historical records indicate that the first human-recorded El Nino occurred in 1525 observed by Spanish explorers. Other studies suggest strong ancient El Ninos ended Peruvian civilizations. The main point here is that strong El Ninos are natural, and not increasing in relationship to global warming.
El Ninos often occur in “bundles”. Typically, the first El Nino in a bundle is of lower intensity, subsequent El Ninos are progressively more intense, often ending with a high-intensity El Nino. This El Nino bundle pattern is remarkably like the progression of well-monitored and well-understood land-based volcanic and tectonic events, which typically build through time to a final large volcanic eruption or tectonic event.
The ocean surface shape of all El Nino Sea Surface temperature anomalies is identical. If El Ninos were the result of global atmospheric warming, there should be some variance in shape.
Ocean warming acts strongly affects ocean coral reef systems, often referred to as “coral bleaching”. I believe that the alteration of coral reefs is a natural and necessary effect caused by geologically induced El Ninos. Effects that fit into the Natural Selection Theory developed by geologist Charles Darwin while visiting the geologically active Galapagos Island Rift System region. Take for example the U.S. Forest Service’s “Forest Fire Suppression Policy” that reigned supreme from 1900 until 1995. During this time, forest fires were considered extremely dangerous and harmful to both the public and forests. Foresters claimed that these monstrous walls of destruction that raged through our beautiful forests killing humans, animals, and plants, and destroying homes were unnatural and needed to be suppressed. Today’s forest management policies are quite different. The new policies are built on the premise that forest fires are necessary agents of natural selection.
El Nino-warming and chemical changes of Pacific Ocean seawater have a strong influence on Pacific Ocean phytoplankton distribution by enriching the ocean with iron, phosphorus, etc. Geological emissions from active ocean floor features are known to emit these minerals.
All El Nino/La Nina computer prediction models loaded with atmospheric and shallow oceanic data consistently fail, likely because they are modeling the “side effects” of geologically warmed/cooled oceans and not the “cause” of the El Nino/La Nina event. All of these models, including the current model, do not have the ability to project the timing of occurrence, magnitude, frequency, generation by heat pulses, and “bundling” patterns more than a few months in advance.
El Nino/La Nina events are associated with geological seismicity or volcanism in the point source area (Guillas 5-28-2010).
It is evident the generation of an El Nino is immediately followed by the generation of a La Nina proving that one cycle and not separate events.

Summary
Significant amounts of data and information gathered from varying scientific disciplines prove that the generation of El Ninos and La Ninas is the result of fluids, chemicals, and gases emitted from ocean-floor geological features. Features that are located in a small geographical area in the far western portion of the Pacific Ocean.

Geologist: How Geologic Factors Generate El Nino And La Nina Events