"Dry" Season Could Be A Hot One
According to weather experts, this "dry" season could be one of the hottest in the last number of years. Farmers will be most affected, as the experts say that the areas of Guanacaste and the Central Valley will see less rain than normal for the season and more flooding in the Limón province.

The weather is being blamed on the phenomenum known as "el Niño" which has been affecting our country since August. Proof of that is the fact that September was the driest recorded in the last several years, with 30% less rain.

The Guanacaste region normally receives some 1.400 millilitres of rain each year, this year it only received 900 millilitres. The Instituto Nacional Meteorológico (IMN) is predicting that the Central Valley (San José and surrounding areas) could be one of the area most affected by the low water levels.

The IMN says that while there could be problems with drought in the Pacific coastal areas, the Caribbean coast could see more rain and possible flooding.

Affected most by the climatic changes are farm production, according to the Ministerio de la Producción, who has begun as series of training programs to help farmers.

El Niño is a global coupled ocean-atmosphere phenomenon. The Pacific ocean signatures, El Niño and La Niña (also written in English as El Nino and La Nina) are major temperature fluctuations in surface waters of the tropical Eastern Pacific Ocean.

The names, from the Spanish for "the little boy" and "the little girl", refer to the Christ child, because the phenomenon is usually noticed around Christmas time in the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of South America.

Their effect on climate in the southern hemisphere is profound.

These effects were first described in 1923 by Sir Gilbert Thomas Walker from whom the Walker circulation, an important aspect of the Pacific phenomenon, takes its name.

El Niño is associated with a positive anomaly, and La Niña with a negative anomaly.