ABSTRACT:The aim of the present study is to contribute to the correctness and effectiveness of weather forecast communication, the importance of which has been steadily growing along with the improvement in numerical weather prediction models and methods as well as the general awareness about the increase of extreme events within a context of global climate change. An extensive survey was conducted among the general users of the weather forecasts issued by the regional meteorological service of Tuscany, Italy (LaMMA Consortium), which resulted in 2388 volunteers responding to the questions aimed at better understanding of how people access, interpret and use weather forecasts. The survey also includes some items investigated in previous research, allowing comparison with similar findings in other countries. The most critical issue concerns the uncertainty information, investigated with the main aim of verifying the existence and relevance of inferential mechanisms in the interpretation of weather icons and maps used in LaMMA forecasts to assess uncertainty. The present study also discusses users' interpretations of the probability of precipitation forecasts and their preferences on how forecast uncertainty is conveyed. Results show that, even if the Italian public is accustomed to strictly deterministic weather forecasts, people attribute uncertainty to them on their own even if lacking any explicit indication, thus suggesting the need to supplement the existing forecasts with both graphical and textual information about uncertainty, particularly in the case of precipitation forecasts.

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This study investigates changes in precipitation regimes in Tuscany (central Italy) over the 1955–2013 period, by using the precipitation concentration index (PCI) and rainfall amount. The PCI is a dimensionless indicator of the temporal concentration of the precipitation. Different statistical methods were applied over the whole period and two independent sub‐periods (1955–1984 and 1985–2013). A p‐value <0.05 was chosen as level of significance for all the statistical tests. Main results, coming from 35 weather stations, did not show statistically significant trends of the PCI on annual basis and during winter. In spring and summer statistically significant increases were found, respectively, in two stations in northern Apennine (+1.6/50 years) and in four stations in central southern inner areas (+2.3/50 years). In autumn one station in northern Apennine showed a significant decrease (−1.9/50 years). Sub‐periods analysis mainly showed higher values of PCI in the recent sub‐period on annual scale (statistically significant along the coast), in spring (significant in northwest and northern Apennine), in summer (significant in central southern inner areas) and during winter (not significant). Considering the year‐to‐year variability of the annual PCI, statistically significant increasing trends were found in the northern part of Tuscany, while decreasing tendencies were observed in the southern one. Concerning annual rainfall, six stations showed statistically significant decreases (−19%/50 years). On monthly basis, two stations exhibited significant decreasing trends in March and two in December (respectively −48% and −37%/50 years). Two significant decreases were observed in both June and July (respectively −53% and −63%/50 years). One station in northern coast showed instead a significant increase in September (+72%/50 years). This investigation represents a further tile in the larger mosaic of analysis of climate change and its different impact on precipitation regime at regional level and supports studies concerning water management in the areas characterized by strong seasonality.

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Abstract:A drought-monitoring and forecasting system developed for the Tuscany region was improved in order to provide a semi-automatic, more detailed, timely and comprehensive operational service for decision making, water authorities, researchers and general stakeholders. Ground-based and satellite data from different sources (regional meteorological stations network, MODIS Terra satellite and CHIRPS/CRU precipitation datasets) are integrated through an open-source, interoperable SDI (spatial data infrastructure) based on PostgreSQL/PostGIS to produce vegetation and precipitation indices that allow following of the occurrence and evolution of a drought event. The SDI allows the dissemination of comprehensive, up-to-date and customizable information suitable for different end-users through different channels, from a web page and monthly bulletins, to interoperable web services, and a comprehensive climate service. The web services allow geospatial elaborations on the fly, and the geo-database can be increased with new input/output data to respond to specific requests or to increase the spatial resolution.

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Abstract.A system for drought monitoring and medium-long time forecasting in the Tuscany region (central Italy) is briefly introduced, which is based on ground and satellite data (1 km spatial resolution and 16-day temporal resolution). It is also shown how information about current conditions and future evolution of a drought event is periodically delivered on the LaMMA Consortium website, in collaboration with the Institute of Biometeorology (IBIMET-CNR).