Fig. 6: Distribution of equatorial Pacific SSTa maxima for El Niño events of the standard simulations.

For each of the qualified El Niño events, 660 in total, the winter-mean SST anomalies are averaged over the equatorial zone (5°S–5°N), and then the Pacific zonal maximum is located. a Distribution of peak SST anomaly longitudes. b Scatter plot of the peak SST anomaly value vs. the longitude at which it occurs. The blue (red) dots are for the model results (observations). c Distribution of peak SST anomaly values.