Predicting El Niño vs. La Niña vs. neutral: relatively reliable. Predicting how strong the El Niño will be: harder. Predicting exactly what it will do to rainfall, temperatures, storms, or snowfall: substantially less reliable.

And yet people will put forth dire predictions (drought, flooding, hurricanes, tornadoes, heat waves, etc.) every chance they get. No wonder so many people think it is all a hoax.