I'm hearing a lot of people say that the season over here on the west will be ruined by El Nino.
Why?
What is it (in laymans terms) and why will it affect kiteboarding this season?

Yeehah! Good for us in Newcastle on the east coast !!! 2 crap years of wind in the last 2 years (la nina ) and every other year (including this one )since 1998 (el nino ) great

Hey Mate, Ill try my best to answer this for you, el nino is when the trade winds in the pacific are weaker and the mass of warm water in the which controls rain fall moves closer to South america, that puts australia into drought like weather patterns which give the east coast good hot weather, dry summer and good seabreezes. when the warm mass of water moves closer to australia, we have high rainfall, higher chance of cyclones and disturbed weather patterns, ie not much reliable wind on east coast, and the west coast of south america gets the drought like conditions. Trade winds are stronger in the pacific during la nina(this pushes the warm water and air on to our coast. el nino usually lasts 3 to 5 years ( last one went for nearly 9) and la nina is 1 to 3 years How and why it affects the west coast i have no idea except to state the obvious that everything is connected.

I could have some of that info wrong and am open to being corrected, but thats my understanding of it.

from Wikipedia

Elsewhere
In Africa, East Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania and the White Nile basin experiences, in the long rains from March to May, wetter than normal conditions. There also are drier than normal conditions from December to February in south-central Africa, mainly in Zambia, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Botswana. Direct effects of El Niño resulting in drier conditions occur in parts of Southeast Asia and Northern Australia, increasing bush fires and worsening haze and decreasing air quality dramatically. Drier than normal conditions are also generally observed in Queensland, inland Victoria, inland New South Wales and eastern Tasmania from June to August. West of the Antarctic Peninsula, the Ross, Bellingshausen, and Amundsen Sea sectors have more sea ice during El Niño. The latter two and the Weddell Sea also become warmer and have higher atmospheric pressure.

El Niño's effects on Europe are not entirely clear, but certainly it is not nearly as affected as at least large parts of other continents. There is some evidence that an El Niño may cause a wetter, cloudier winter in Northern Europe and a milder, drier winter in the Mediterranean Sea region. The El Niño winter of 2006/2007 was unusually mild in the UK and Western Europe, and the Alps recorded very little snow coverage that season.[28]


No mention of WA there at all