Atmospheric circulation conditions during winter warm spells in Central Europe

The objective of the paper was to characterise the temporal and spatial variability of winter warm spells in Central Europe in the years 1966/1967–2015/2016 and to determine the circulation conditions of their occurrence. The applied data were obtained from the Polish Institute of Meteorology and Wa...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Natural hazards (Dordrecht) 2019-04, Vol.96 (3), p.1413-1428
Main Authors: Tomczyk, Arkadiusz M., Sulikowska, Agnieszka, Bednorz, Ewa, Półrolniczak, Marek
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Air temperature
Anomalies
Atmospheric circulation
Atmospheric research
Civil Engineering
Dynamic height
Earth and Environmental Science
Earth Sciences
Environmental Management
Geophysics/Geodesy
Geopotential
Geopotential height
Geotechnical Engineering & Applied Earth Sciences
Hydrogeology
Meteorology
Natural Hazards
Original Paper
Probability density function
Probability density functions
Probability theory
Spatial variability
Spatial variations
Temperature rise
Troposphere
Water management
Winter
Winter circulation
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Summary:The objective of the paper was to characterise the temporal and spatial variability of winter warm spells in Central Europe in the years 1966/1967–2015/2016 and to determine the circulation conditions of their occurrence. The applied data were obtained from the Polish Institute of Meteorology and Water Management, Deutscher Wetterdienst and the National Centre for Environmental Prediction/National Centre for Atmospheric Research. A warm spell was defined as a sequence of at least three warm days, i.e. when the maximum air temperature is higher than the 95th percentile of the probability density function designated from observation. The research has proven that over the study period the air temperature increased in the winter season in Central Europe and this translated into an increase in the number of warm days. An average of 3–5 warm spells was recorded per 10 years. The most numerous warm spells occurred during three winter seasons, i.e. 1989/1990, 2006/2007 and 2015/2016. The occurrence of warm spells was related to positive anomalies of geopotential heights over the study area in the cross section of the entire troposphere. Maximum anomalies appeared at 250 hPa geopotential height, and they developed on average 9 days before the commencement of warm spells over the study area.
ISSN:0921-030X
1573-0840
DOI:10.1007/s11069-019-03621-4