The reason is that it was largely predictable (This year global cooling) so when Anthony writes: Met Office Data Confirms Record Drop Of Global Temperatures I’m thinking: “why are people getting excited … it was so predictable”…
The El Nino was predictable in the sense that we saw it growing large and so as they last a finite time, the timing and scale of the fall could be predicted (but see end).
What is far less predictable is the following La Nina. It may not happen at all, it may be fairly small, or it may be a whopper of a La Nina. If I had to bet, I would say that the cooling from the La Nina would be longer and/or deeper than normal. In part that is because I think cooling is more likely than warming at the moment. And indeed, if the La Nina lasts long enough, and we get underlying cooling, we may never really exist the La Nina, but instead find ourself in another “Pause”, whereby overall cooling and Post La Nina warming are countering each other, but at a lower temperature than has been prevalent these last two decades.
Warning: Mother nature just abhors predictability as such anyone who tries to predict the climate will very soon be proved wrong. So, these predictions are not “what will happen”, but instead “what is marginally more likely to happen – and we could easily see both cooling and warming far greater in scale than the predictable effects”
Addendum
According to Enso predictions, we are “turning” the corner and about to start coming out of La Nina. If the predictions are right, this move back to normal should be apparent by February. There, if we see a deepening La Nina by February-March it is indicative of a deeper or longer La Nina than “usual”.
