Mexican megadrought

Hunt, B. G.; Elliott, T. I.

doi:10.1007/s00382-002-0265-5

Cited by 27 publications

(17 citation statements)

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“…While there was an ENSO influence on some of these rainfall outliers, their development as outliers again suggests stochastic influences. Stochastic input was noted as a possible contributor to a simulated mega drought in Mexico in the present simulation (Hunt and Elliott, 2002), while Cole et al (2002) have also noted the necessity for undefined factors to account for extended drought in USA.…”

Section: Rainfallmentioning

confidence: 65%

“…With the advent of multi-millennial runs with coupled climatic models (Osborn et al, 1999;Stouffer et al, 2000;Hunt and Elliott, 2002), it is now possible to use the resultant model outputs to investigate climatic outliers. For purposes of the present analysis outliers are defined here to be intense and brief anomalies: thus their magnitudes should be either > +3 standard deviations (SD) or < −3 SD, with a duration of the order of one year.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Climatic outliers

Hunt¹

2006

Intl Journal of Climatology

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Abstract:A 10 000-year simulation for 'present' climate has been generated with the CSIRO Mark 2 coupled climatic model. In this paper the model output has been analysed to produce a climatology of climatic outliers and to assess the role of such outliers in climatic variability. An assessment of the frequency of occurrence of outliers, compared with the statistical expectation from a Gaussian distribution, indicates that over most of the globe the surface temperature conforms to this distribution, but this is not the case for rainfall. Among the issues considered are the spatial occurrence rates over the globe of normalised climatic anomalies of various magnitudes, the temporal variability of outliers, the seasonal variability for a given outlier year, the spatial characteristics of outliers and the question of precursors to outliers. The relationship of outliers to the El Niño/Southern Oscillation, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the North Atlantic Oscillation is also considered. A case study examining the relative severities of an outlier drought to a severe drought is also undertaken. Finally, the role of outliers and the greenhouse effect is considered. It is concluded that outliers are a manifestation of stochastic forcing.

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Section: Rainfallmentioning

confidence: 65%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climatic outliers

Hunt¹

2006

Intl Journal of Climatology

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“…Alternatively, the decadal drought epicenters may have been linked by dynamical ocean-atmospheric mechanisms that favored the development, persistence, and spatial propagation of decadal drought regimes over the continent. The simulation of multidecadal drought over North America by coupled ocean atmospheric models (Hunt and Elliott 2002) offers an opportunity to test potential mechanisms for the development and propagation of drought regimes over the continent. Schubert et al (2004) and Seager et al (2005) describe zonally-symmetric mechanisms in the upper troposphere that link cool conditions in the tropical Pacific to anomalous anticyclones and persistent drought over North America at sub-decadal timescales (> 6-years).…”

Section: The Pattern and Propagation Of Moisture Anomalies During Megmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tree-ring reconstructed megadroughts over North America since a.d. 1300

et al. 2007

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“…In a wide-ranging series of analyses of the present simulation, stochastic influences have been deemed responsible for climatic anomalies associated with the MWP and LIA (Hunt 2006), climatic outliers (Hunt 2007), Maya droughts (Hunt and Elliott 2005), Mexican megadrought (Hunt and Elliott 2002) and other climatic features.…”

Section: Possible Mechanisms Controlling Long-term Changes In Greenlamentioning

confidence: 99%

Natural climatic variability and the Norse settlements in Greenland

Hunt

2009

Climatic Change

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A multi-millennial simulation with the CSIRO Mark 2 coupled global climatic model has been used to determine whether climatic conditions approximate to those experienced by the medieval Norse settlers in Greenland could be identified. The aim of this analysis was to see whether such conditions could be replicated by the natural climatic variability in this unforced simulation, in order to counteract claims that the current observed global warming is merely another example of this type of climatic regime. This view has been expressed in the media in an attempt to refute the existence of a CO 2 -induced global warming. A 291-year period of above-average temperature followed by a 41-year cooler period were identified in one millennium of the simulation, and subsequently used as an analogue of conditions representative of the time of the Norse settlements. Considerable interannual variability existed in both these periods, but with noticeable positive and negative surface temperature anomalies in the warm and cold periods respectively. Thus the warm period was not a time of uniform benign conditions. Above-average precipitation was also associated with the warm period, and these climatic conditions would have enhanced pasture growth and hay production (the only crop the Norse produced) thereby sustaining the livelihood of the Norse Greenlanders. The climatic conditions associated with the cold period in the model were probably sufficient to limit the survival prospects of the settlers, especially when other, probably more critical, deleterious factors are taken into account. The temperature anomalies replicated in the simulation are similar to the limited proxy data, but may be smaller in magnitude: nevertheless they appear to be sufficiently large to have affected the viability of the Norse Greenlanders.

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Mexican megadrought

Cited by 27 publications

References 0 publications

Climatic outliers

Climatic outliers

Tree-ring reconstructed megadroughts over North America since a.d. 1300

Natural climatic variability and the Norse settlements in Greenland

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