At a Glance
- In 2025, the Gulf of Panama’s seasonal upwelling, a process that cools and enriches the water, failed for the first time in at least 40 years of observation.
- This vital natural phenomenon supports the region’s productive fisheries and protects its coral reefs from thermal stress by bringing cold, nutrient-rich deep water to the surface annually.
- Scientists attribute the unprecedented event to a significant reduction in the strength and consistency of the northerly trade winds that typically drive the upwelling process from January to April.
- The immediate consequences include diminished marine productivity and increased heat stress on sensitive coral ecosystems, with potentially severe long-term impacts on the local economy and environment.
- This event highlights the urgent need for better monitoring of vulnerable tropical ocean systems to understand how climate disruption is altering fundamental planetary processes that support life.
For the first time in at least 40 years, the Gulf of Panama’s seasonal upwelling—a predictable and life-sustaining oceanic process—failed to occur in 2025, according to a new study from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI). This annual event, driven by powerful northerly trade winds, has reliably cooled the gulf’s surface and supported a vibrant marine ecosystem. The unprecedented failure of this system raises serious concerns about the impacts of climate disruption on fundamental ocean processes and the coastal communities that have depended on them for generations.
Upwelling is a natural phenomenon where strong, consistent winds push warm surface water away from the coast, allowing cold, nutrient-rich water from the deep ocean to rise and take its place. In Panama, this process typically occurs during the dry season from January to April, acting like a natural fertilizer for the ocean. The influx of nutrients fuels the growth of phytoplankton, the base of the marine food web, which in turn supports highly productive fisheries. This annual cooling also provides a crucial refuge for coral reefs, protecting them from the damaging effects of heat stress.
The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), pinpoints a significant reduction in the strength, frequency, and duration of the Panama wind-jet as the primary cause for the 2025 event. Scientists theorize this weakening of the winds may be connected to the position of the Intertropical Convergence Zone during the 2024–2025 La Niña event. However, the exact mechanisms are still under investigation. Without the upwelling, researchers observed that the typical drop in sea surface temperature and the spike in biological productivity were severely diminished.
This landmark discovery, one of the first significant findings from a collaboration between STRI and the Max Planck Institute’s S/Y Eugen Seibold research vessel, serves as a stark warning. It highlights the vulnerability of tropical upwelling systems worldwide, which are often poorly monitored despite their immense ecological and economic importance. The event highlights the urgent need to enhance ocean-climate observation and forecasting capabilities to understand better and predict how climate change will continue to impact the ecosystems of our planet’s oceans.
References
- O’Dea, A., Sellers, A. J., Pérez-Medina, C., Pardo Díaz, J., Guzmán Bloise, A., Pöhlker, C., Chiliński, M. T., Aardema, H. M., Cybulski, J. D., Heins, L., Paton, S. R., Slagter, H. A., Schiebel, R., & Haug, G. H. (2025). Unprecedented suppression of Panama’s Pacific upwelling in 2025. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 122(36), e2512056122. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2512056122
- Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. (2025, September 1). For the first time in 40 Years, Panama’s deep and cold ocean waters fail to emerge. Phys.Org; Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. https://phys.org/news/2025-09-years-panama-deep-cold-ocean.html
