Extreme precipitation events over Saudi Arabia during the wet season and their associated teleconnections

Atif, Rana Muhammad; Almazroui, Mansour; Saeed, Sajjad; Abid, Muhammad Adnan; Islam, Md. Nazrul; Ismail, Muhammad

doi:10.1016/j.atmosres.2019.104655

Cited by 39 publications

(28 citation statements)

References 64 publications

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“…Rainfall events with threshold values of ≥25 mm and above have the lowest occurrence rate during the period 1978-2019. Rainfall events with a threshold of ≥25 mm may be considered as genuine extremes [2], and are investigated further below. The frequency time series results are consistent with the spatial distribution, as shown in Figure 7a-f. Interestingly, Figure 9 shows that the frequency of extreme events at all thresholds decreased significantly after 2000, though it increased again in recent years after 2010.…”

Section: Extreme Rainfall Events Frequency and Trendsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Extreme rainfall events have severe socio-economic impacts, often resulting in droughts, strong winds, and flash floods, and disrupting the environment, including the human population [1,2]. Consequently, any changes in the frequency and intensity of such events are of significant interest.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Moreover, the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) significantly impacts the wet season precipitation variability over Saudi Arabia through large changes in the moisture availability, as well as variability in the westerly jet passing over the region. This results in anomalous conditions [35] and triggers rainfall extremes, which are more frequent during the positive phase of ENSO 4 [2].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Rainfall Trends and Extremes in Saudi Arabia in Recent Decades

Almazroui

2020

Atmosphere

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The observed records of recent decades show increased economic damage associated with flash flooding in different regions of Saudi Arabia. An increase in extreme rainfall events may cause severe repercussions for the socio-economic sectors of the country. The present study investigated the observed rainfall trends and associated extremes over Saudi Arabia for the 42-year period of 1978–2019. It measured the contribution of extreme events to the total rainfall and calculated the changes to mean and extreme rainfall events over five different climate regions of Saudi Arabia. Rainfall indices were constructed by estimating the extreme characteristics associated with daily rainfall frequency and intensity. The analysis reveals that the annual rainfall is decreasing (5.89 mm decade−1, significant at the 90% level) over Saudi Arabia for the entire analysis period, while it increased in the most recent decade. On a monthly scale, the most significant increase (5.44 mm decade−1) is observed in November and the largest decrease (1.20 mm decade−1) in January. The frequency of intense rainfall events is increasing for the majority of stations over Saudi Arabia, while the frequency of weak events is decreasing. More extreme rainfall events are occurring in the northwest, east, and southwest regions of Saudi Arabia. A daily rainfall of ≥ 26 mm is identified as the threshold for an extreme event. It is found that the contribution of extreme events to the total rainfall amount varies from region to region and season to season. The most considerable contribution (up to 56%) is found in the southern region in June. Regionally, significant contribution comes from the coastal region, where extreme events contribute, on average, 47% of the total rainfall each month from October to February, with the largest (53%) in November. For the entire country, extreme rainfall contributes most (52%) in November and least (20%) in July, while contributions from different stations are in the 8–50% range of the total rainfall.

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Section: Extreme Rainfall Events Frequency and Trendsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Rainfall Trends and Extremes in Saudi Arabia in Recent Decades

Almazroui

2020

Atmosphere

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“…Observations show that in recent decades, precipitation over Saudi Arabia has followed a decreasing trend (a drop of 47.8 mm/decade for the period 1978-2009 [4]), although the number of heavy precipitation events has increased in the last decade. Recently, Atif et al [7] assessed extreme precipitation events over the Peninsula based on observations from 1984-2016. They reported a high number of extreme precipitation events over northeastern, central and southwestern coastal parts of Saudi Arabia.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climate Extremes over the Arabian Peninsula Using RegCM4 for Present Conditions Forced by Several CMIP5 Models

Almazroui

2019

Atmosphere

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This paper investigates the temperature and precipitation extremes over the Arabian Peninsula using data from the regional climate model RegCM4 forced by three Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) models and ERA–Interim reanalysis data. Indices of extremes are calculated using daily temperature and precipitation data at 27 meteorological stations located across Saudi Arabia in line with the suggested procedure from the Expert Team on Climate Change Detection and Indices (ETCCDI) for the present climate (1986–2005) using 1981–2000 as the reference period. The results show that RegCM4 accurately captures the main features of temperature extremes found in surface observations. The results also show that RegCM4 with the CLM land–surface scheme performs better in the simulation of precipitation and minimum temperature, while the BATS scheme is better than CLM in simulating maximum temperature. Among the three CMIP5 models, the two best performing models are found to accurately reproduce the observations in calculating the extreme indices, while the other is not so successful. The reason for the good performance by these two models is that they successfully capture the circulation patterns and the humidity fields, which in turn influence the temperature and precipitation patterns that determine the extremes over the study region.

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“…The EA‐WA sector has been previously identified as being a region where precipitation can be forecast with higher skill compared to most places of the globe on the subseasonal time scale (Tippett et al, ; Vigaud et al, ). Enhanced probabilities of above‐normal rainfall in Week 3–4 forecasts (i.e., 15–28 days in advance) for starts during El Niño and MJO Phase 7 are consistent with regional influences from ENSO (Abid et al, ; Alizadeh‐Choobari et al, ; Atif et al, ; Barlow et al, ; Hoell et al, ; Hoell, Barlow, Cannon, & Xu, ; Kang et al, ; Kijazi and Reason, ; Mutai and Ward, ; Nicholson, ; Soltani et al, ; Rana et al, , ) and the MJO (Barlow et al, , ; Hoell et al, ; Hoell, Cannon, & Barlow, ; Mutai and Ward, ; Pohl and Camberlin, , ; Pohl et al, ; Nazemosadat and Ghaedamini, ; Nazemosadat and Shahgholian, ). As noted in the recent review from Barlow et al (), regional droughts have also been related to ENSO (Al Senafi and Anis, ; Athar, ; Barlow et al, ; Donat et al, ; Hoell et al, , , ; Krichak et al, ; Mariotti et al, ; Mariotti, ; Nazemosadat and Ghasemi, ; Niranjan and Ouarda, ; Price et al, ; Syed et al, ; Yin et al, ) and the MJO (Barlow et al, ; Barlow, ; Hoell et al, ; Nazemosadat and Ghaedamini, ; Pourasghar et al, ; Tippett et al, ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 54%

Deterministic Skill of Subseasonal Precipitation Forecasts for the East Africa‐West Asia Sector from September to May

Vigaud¹,

Tippett

Robertson³

2019

JGR Atmospheres

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The East Africa-West Asia (EA-WA) sector is a region where the skill in forecasting rainfall is unusually high in the subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) time range and where ENSO and MJO signals have significant impacts. Much of regional rainfall intra-seasonal variability is related to tropical-temperate interactions on synoptic time scales, and we examine whether the skill of dynamical S2S forecasts for the region exceeds the predictability associated with ENSO and the MJO. Deterministic skill (Spearman's rank correlation) of multimodel ensemble forecasts of weekly and Week 3-4 precipitation averages is examined for starts in September-April, based on three ensemble prediction systems (EPS) from the S2S prediction project over the common 1999-2010 reforecasts period. The skill of weekly forecasts decreases with increasing lead but remains statistically significant out to Week 3 and Week 4, a level of skill that has not been previously reported at such leads. The skill of Week 3-4 forecasts is higher than that of Week 3 or Week 4 forecasts. The prediction skill of weekly and 2-week precipitation averages from ENSO and the MJO is estimated using a multiple linear regression and found to be less than that achieved by the dynamical forecasts for Week 3, Week 4, and Week 3-4 targets. This is evidence for achievable forecast skill that extends beyond typical weather-scale lead times and that is not simply related to ENSO or MJO signals. The opportunity for skillful predictions is illustrated through successful forecasts up to 4 weeks in advance of extreme rainfall over the Arabian peninsula related to strong tropical-temperate interactions during weak ENSO and MJO conditions.

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Extreme precipitation events over Saudi Arabia during the wet season and their associated teleconnections

Cited by 39 publications

References 64 publications

Rainfall Trends and Extremes in Saudi Arabia in Recent Decades

Rainfall Trends and Extremes in Saudi Arabia in Recent Decades

Climate Extremes over the Arabian Peninsula Using RegCM4 for Present Conditions Forced by Several CMIP5 Models

Deterministic Skill of Subseasonal Precipitation Forecasts for the East Africa‐West Asia Sector from September to May

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