Long‐term variability and trends in meteorological droughts in Western Europe (1851–2018)

Vicente‐Serrano, Sergio M.; Domínguez‐Castro, Fernando; Murphy, Conor; Hannaford, Jamie; Reig, F.; Peña‐Angulo, Dhais; Tramblay, Yves; Trigo, Ricardo M.; Donald, Neil Mac; Luna, M. Y.; Carthy, Mark Mc; Schrier, Gerard van der; Turco, Marco; Camuffo, Dario; Noguera, Iván; García‐Herrera, Ricardo; Becherini, Francesca; Valle, Antonio della; Tomás-Burguera, Miquel; Kenawy, Ahmed El

doi:10.1002/joc.6719

Cited by 61 publications

(59 citation statements)

References 103 publications

(140 reference statements)

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“…The increase in the number of CHD events over the south-eastern part of Europe is mainly due to an increase both in the duration of heatwaves over this region (Figure 3A) as well as in the frequency of the HW events (Figure 3B). Overall, August SPI3 indicates an overall wetting over the northern part of Europe and a drying tendency over the southern part of Europe (Figure 3C), which is in agreement with previous studies regarding the change in the occurrence of drought events over Europe, based on the SPI drought index Vicente-Serrano et al, 2021).…”

Section: Historical Evolution Of Compound Events (Hot and Dry)supporting

confidence: 92%

Compound Hot and Dry Events in Europe: Variability and Large-Scale Drivers

2021

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An important aspect of inevitable surprises, for the climate system, is the potential of occurrence of compound extreme events. These can be events that occur at the same time over the same geographic location or at multiple locations within a given country or around the world. In this study, we investigate the spatio-temporal variability of summer compound hot and dry (CHD) events at European level and we quantify the relationship between the occurrence of CHDs and the large-scale atmospheric circulation. Here we show that summer 1955 stands out as the year with the largest spatial extent characterized by hot and dry conditions (~21.2% at European level), followed by 2015 (~20.3%), 1959 (~19.4%), and 1950 (~16.9%). By employing an Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis we show that there are three preferred centers of action of CHDs over Europe: Fennoscandia, the central part of Europe, and the south-eastern part of Europe. Overall, hot and dry summers are, in general, associated with persistent high-pressure systems over the regions affected by CHDs, which in turn reduces the zonal flow and diverts the storm tracks southward. The high-pressure systems associated with each mode of variability largely suppresses ascending motions, reduces water vapor condensation and precipitation formation, leading to drought conditions below this atmospheric system. This study may help improve our understanding of the spatio-temporal variability of hot and dry summers, at European level, as well as their driving mechanisms.

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Section: Historical Evolution Of Compound Events (Hot and Dry)supporting

confidence: 92%

Compound Hot and Dry Events in Europe: Variability and Large-Scale Drivers

2021

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“…Both indices are very similar, with the Pearson correlation coefficient between them being ρ = 0.99, and both match the same dry periods. This indicates that the contribution of precipitation deficits to the drought severity in the BRB prevails over the temperature excess, unlike other regions, such as the Mediterranean region, where the increase in the atmospheric evaporative demand driven by increasing temperatures in the last decades has enhanced droughts, independently of the precipitation evolution in the region [49,50]. In fact, the link between droughts and heat waves is widely known: high temperatures accelerate soil drying and dry soils in turn warm the atmosphere by retaining less water for evapotranspiration [51].…”

Section: Drought Characteristics During the Period Of 1980-2017mentioning

confidence: 99%

Mechanisms for Severe Drought Occurrence in the Balsas River Basin (Mexico)

et al. 2021

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This work provides an assessment of the two most intense seasonal droughts that occurred over the Balsas River Basin (BRB) in the period 1980–2017. The detection of the drought events was performed using the 6 month scale standardized precipitation–evapotranspiration index (SPEI-6) and the 6 month standardized precipitation index (SPI-6) in October. Both indices were quite similar during the studied period, highlighting the larger contribution of precipitation deficits vs. temperature excess to the drought occurrence in the basin. The origin of the atmospheric water arriving to the BRB (1 May 1980–31 October 2017) was investigated by using a Lagrangian diagnosis method. The BRB receives moisture from the Caribbean Sea and the rest of the tropical Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, the eastern north Pacific and from three terrestrial evaporative sources: the region north of BRB, the south of BRB and the BRB itself. The terrestrial evaporative source of the BRB itself is by far the main moisture source. The two most intense drought events that occurred in the studied period were selected for further analysis. During the severe drought of 2005, the summertime sea surface temperature (SST) soared over the Caribbean Sea, extending eastward into a large swathe of tropical North Atlantic, which was accompanied by the record to date of hurricane activity. This heating generated a Rossby wave response with westward propagating anticyclonic/cyclonic gyres in the upper/lower troposphere. A cyclonic low-level circulation developed over the Gulf of Mexico and prevented the moisture from arriving to the BRB, with a consequent deficit in precipitation. Additionally, subsidence also prevented convection in most of the months of this drought period. During the extreme drought event of 1982, the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) remained southern and stronger than the climatological mean over the eastern tropical Pacific, producing an intense regional Hadley circulation. The descent branch of this cell inhibited the development of convection over the BRB, although the moisture sources increased their contributions; however, these were bounded to the lower levels by a strong trade wind inversion.

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“…Raso (1993) stressed the severity of the drought periods identified at the beginning of the twentieth century, but also heavy droughts in 1949-1950(Esteban-Parra et al, 1998Olcina, 1994), the beginning of the 1980s (Pérez Cueva, 1983;Raso et al, 1981), but also between 1990and 1995(Vicente-Serrano, 2013. More recent studies suggest that an examination of precipitation series has not found any drought trends since at least 1870 (Coll et al, 2017;Vicente-Serrano et al, 2020b). An analysis based on high spatial resolution drought datasets has shown no relevant trends in drought magnitude and duration since 1961 (Domínguez-Castro et al, 2019b).…”

Section: The Study Of Drought Variability and Trendsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Over the last decade, Spanish researchers have studied drought variability and trends in other regions of the world, including global analysis (Vicente-Serrano et al, 2017b), studies on a European level (Serra et al, 2014;Vicente-Serrano et al, 2020b), in other European countries like Portugal (Santos et al, 2010) and Italy (Baronetti et al, 2020), and in other areas, including Syria (Mathbout et al, 2018), Iran (Karimi et al, 2020), Bolivia (Maillard et al, 2020;Vicente-Serrano et al, 2015b), Ethiopia (El Kenawy et al, 2016, Oman (El Kenawy et al, 2020), Mexico (Serrano-Barrios et al, 2016, and Vietnam (Stojanovic et al, 2020).…”

Section: The Study Of Drought Variability and Trendsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The evolution of climatic drought studies in Spain over the last few decades

Serrano¹

2021

Geograph

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This study reviews the evolution of scientific research on climatic droughts in Spain over the last few decades. The complexity of this natural hazard and the wide incidence of droughts in Spain have led to great interest from scientists in Spain, and generated a significant amount of scientific work on the topic over the last two decades. Climatic drought studies have evolved from predominantly descriptive studies up to the 1990s to highly diverse research topics, which include the development of indices, tools and datasets, the study of drought hazard probability, the analysis of drought variability and trends, including research on long term drought reconstructions and analysis with instrumental data, an assessment of drought mechanisms and drivers, and drought modeling, including how models represent droughts, and applying models to drought forecasting and future projections. The study of climatic droughts in Spain is highly internationalized, since most of the current scientific studies are published in high-impact international journals and, nowadays, do not only cover Spain, but also other world regions as well as continental and global studies.

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Long‐term variability and trends in meteorological droughts in Western Europe (1851–2018)

Cited by 61 publications

References 103 publications

Compound Hot and Dry Events in Europe: Variability and Large-Scale Drivers

Compound Hot and Dry Events in Europe: Variability and Large-Scale Drivers

Mechanisms for Severe Drought Occurrence in the Balsas River Basin (Mexico)

The evolution of climatic drought studies in Spain over the last few decades

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