Long-term variability in reconstructed and observed snow cover over the last 100 winter seasons in Cracow and Zakopane (southern Poland)

Abstract

An attempt to reconstruct the seasonal snow cover data in Cracow (for 26 winter seasons) and Zakopane (for 19 winter seasons) at the turn of the 20th century based on climatic data was made by using multiple regression. The results of the reconstruction were more successful for the station located at lower altitude (Cracow, 206 m above sea level) and allowed an analysis of nival conditions to be extended over 104 winter seasons. The reconstructed data obtained for Zakopane (857 m above sea level) appear to be overestimated for the number of snow cover days and sum of daily snow cover depth. Thus, they were excluded from further calculations. The mean snow cover duration at Zakopane (128 d yr -1 ) is twice as long as that at Cracow. An analysis of long-term variability of seasonal snow cover duration, seasonal maximum snow depth and sum of daily snow cover depth in Cracow for the period 1895/96-1998/99 and in Zakopane for the periods 1895/96-1998/99 and 1914/15-1998/99 showed no statistically significant trend in any case. The statistically significant (p < 0.05) decreasing trend of snow cover duration at both stations (-13 d/10 yr in Cracow, -8 d/10 yr in Zakopane) in the period 1961-1990 could be selected for the whole period investigated. The variation coefficient for snow cover duration is over twice as large for Cracow (37%) as for Zakopane (15%). KEY WORDS: Snow cover · Reconstruction · Climate variability · Time series analysis · Southern PolandResale or republication not permitted without written consent of the publisher

Analysis of the Course and Frequency of High Water Stages in Selected Catchments of the Upper Vistula Basin in the South of Poland

“…Pińskwar [40] and Niedźwiedź et al [41] discovered upward trends in the analyzed metrics of daily rainfall that were, however, not significant again. Also Falarz [42], who investigated the time of snow cover presence, observed a downward but insignificant trend for this phenomenon. Similarly, Kundzewicz et al [22] reported that the presence of trends for climatic The highest values of Q max in the investigated river catchments were recorded in 1997, 1998 and 2010.…”

Variability of high rainfalls and related synoptic situations causing heavy floods at the northern foothills of the Tatra Mountains

“…During the last 62 years, it varied from 107 days in 1989 to 177 days in 1952. The number of days with snow cover in the Tatra Mountains increases with altitude at a rate of 9 days 100 m −1 and varies from less than 120 days at the mountain base to about 220-290 days on the highest peaks (Hess 1965 A statistically significant decreasing trend of snow cover duration (−8 days 10 years −1 ) and maximum snow cover depth (−9 cm 10 years −1 ) has been detected in Zakopane for the period 1961-1990(Falarz 2002. No such trend can, however, be found at the scale of the twentieth century (period 1915-1999).…”

Projected changes of snow conditions and avalanche activity in a warming climate: the French Alps over the 2020–2050 and 2070–2100 periods

“…Brown, 2000;Mote, 2003;Huntington et al, 2004;McCabe and Wolock, 2010), several studies have documented decreases in snow precipitation, snow depths, snow cover durations or snow water equivalent in many countries of the Alpine region (e.g. Falarz, 2002Falarz, , 2004Laternser and Schneebeli, 2003;ONERC, 2008;Valt and Cianfarra, 2010;Serquet et al, 2011;Marty and Meister, 2012). Increased variability has also been observed, especially for winter temperatures, inducing an increasing number of warm winter spells (Beniston, 2005a).…”