This paper aims to reveal the annual regime, time series, and long-term water temperature trends of the Danube River at Bratislava, Slovakia, between the years 1926 and 2005. First, the main factors affecting the river's water temperature were identified. Using multiple regression techniques, an empirical relationship is derived between monthly water temperatures and monthly atmospheric temperatures at Vienna (Hohe Warte), Austria, monthly discharge of the Danube, and some other factors as well. In the second part of the study, the long-term trends in the annual time series of water temperature were identified. The following series were evaluated: 1) The average annual water temperature (To) (determined as an arithmetic average of daily temperatures in the Danube at Bratislava), 2) the weighted annual average temperature values (To ) (determined from the daily temperatures weighted by the daily discharge rates at Bratislava), and 3) the average heat load (Zt) at the Bratislava station. In the long run, the To series is rising; however, the trend of the weighted long-term average temperature values, To , is near zero. This result indicates that the average heat load of the Danube water did not change during the selected period of 80 yr. What did change is the interannual distribution of the average monthly discharge. Over the past 25 yr, an elevated runoff of "cold" water (increase of the December-April runoff) and a lower runoff of "warm" water (decrease of the river runoff during the summer months of June-August) were observed.

Abstract:In this paper we focused on the history of floods and extreme flood frequency analysis of the upper Danube River at Bratislava. Firstly, we briefly describe the flood marks found on the Danube River in the region of Bratislava, Slovakia, and provide an account of the floods' consequences. Secondly, we analyzed the annual maximum discharge series for the period 1876-2012, including the most recent flood of June 2013. Thirdly, we compare the values of T-year design discharge computed with and without incorporating the historic floods (floods of the years 1501, 1682, and 1787 into the 138-year series of annual discharge peaks). There are unfortunately only a few historic flood marks preserved in Bratislava, but there are very important and old marks in neighbouring Hainburg and other Austrian cities upstream to Passau. The calculated T-year maximum discharge of the Danube at Bratislava for the period 1876-2010 without and with historic flood values have been compared. Our analysis showed that without incorporating the historic floods from the years 1501, 1682, and 1787 the 1000-year discharge calculated only with data from the instrumented period 1876-2013 is 14,188 m 3 s -1 , and it is lower compared to the 1000-year discharge of 14,803 m 3 s -1 when the three historic floods are included. In general, the T-year discharge is higher throughout the whole spectrum of T-year discharges (10, 20, 50, 100, 200, 500-year discharge) when the three historic floods are included. Incorporating historic floods into a time series of maximum annual discharge seems to exert a significant effect on the estimates of low probability floods. This has important implications for flood managements and estimation of flood design discharge.

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Abstract:The study is focused on the analysis and statistical evaluation of the joint probability of the occurrence of hydrological variables such as peak discharge (Q), volume (V) and duration (t). In our case study, we focus on the bivariate statistical analysis of these hydrological variables of the Danube River in Bratislava gauging station, during the period of 1876-2013. The study presents the methodology of the bivariate statistical analysis, choice of appropriate marginal distributions and appropriate copula functions in representing the joint distribution. Finally, the joint return periods and conditional return periods for some hydrological pairs (Q-V, V-t, Q-t) were calculated. The approach using copulas can reproduce a wide range of correlation (nonlinear) frequently observed in hydrology. Results of this study provide comprehensive information about flood where a devastating effect may be increased in the case where its three basic components (or at least two of them) Q, V and t have the same significance.