El Niño is a spectacular weather phenomena that occurs every two to seven years, and it's the perfect candidate to blame for this year's record-breaking hot summer.
Naturally, the fact that summer is ended and fall's more comfortable temps have arrived is wonderful news. Bad news, eh?
According to National Geographic, El Niño is a climatic trend that results in "the unusual warming of surface waters in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean."
It is a component of the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) cycle, a meteorological phenomena that also includes El Niño and La Niña, its sister pattern.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration defines the ENSO cycle as the "coherent and sometimes very strong year-to-year variations in sea-surface.
The phenomena has a significant impact on worldwide weather patterns and occurs about every two to seven years, however it has no established timeline.
Storms travel via the jet stream, which is "a river of air," and it tends to pass the South during El Niño years.
Temperatures, rainfall, surface air pressure, and atmospheric circulation that occur across the equatorial Pacific Ocean."