he jet stream. the jet stream is normally a single river of air that soars over North America, but it often splits in two during an El Ni±o. One portion moves south toward the Gulf states, and the other moves north over Canada. This split often sweeps away the high pressure ridge that serves to protect California from Pacific storms, and it also eliminates the expressway of arctic air that usually descends over the northeast.
To date, the effect of an El Ni±o condition on the weather in California is unpredictable--though it is clear that there are massive effects, it seems that the nature of the effects may depend on the specific course of a given El Ni±o condition or on other factors not yet understood. For instance, an El Ni...