TOKYO (REUTERS) - Japan's weather bureau said on Friday (Nov 9) the El Niño weather pattern appears to have formed and that there was a 70 per cent chance it would continue into the Northern Hemisphere spring.

A US government weather forecaster on Thursday projected an 80 per cent chance of the El Niño weather pattern forming and continuing through the Northern Hemisphere in winter 2018/19.

The last El Niño, a warming of ocean surface temperatures in the eastern and central Pacific that typically occurs every few years, occurred around 2015/2016 and caused weather-related crop damage, fires and flash floods.