Reconstruction of snow days based on monthly climate indicators in the Swiss pre-alpine region

Diodato, Nazzareno; Fratianni, Simona; Bellocchi, Gianni

doi:10.1007/s10113-020-01639-0

Cited by 7 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 66 publications

(61 reference statements)

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“…These results are consistent with data indicating that temperature-induced precipitation has shifted from snow to rain during the MWP (Fig. 7A), with a general trend of decreasing snowfall in the central Apennines (Perugia station, Pandolfi & Lorenzetti 1996) and the Swiss alpine region (Diodato et al 2020b). This is not surprising, as the reconstruction approach used here relies mainly on parameters related to air temperature.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Modelling snowfall in southern Italy: a historical perspective in the Benevento Valley (1645-2018)

Diodato¹,

Gómara

Bellocchi

2021

Clim. Res.

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The lack of long-term, homogeneous snowfall records is a limitation in environmental studies. Statistical modelling holds potential to extend snowfall records back in time with a limited set of predictors: snow severity and winter-spring temperatures (with their variability) to reflect elevation influences. The annual number of snow days (SDY) in the Benevento Valley (southern Italy) was detailed for the period 1870-2018. Calibrated in the period 1870-1968 (R2 = 0.85) and validated in the period 1969-2018 (R2 = 0.67), the model developed here enabled the reconstruction of a time-series of SDY between 1645 and 2018. This unique series (the longest in southern Italy) shows that SDY peaked during the Little Ice Age (until ~1850), dominated by cold air masses or characterized by winter seasons extending until May (1655, 1684, 1763 and 1830) or June (1620). After the change-point detected in 1866, the modelled SDY time-series declined rapidly (Modern Warming Period, 1867-2018). The atmospheric conditions that favoured snowfall in the Benevento Valley throughout the study period were generally associated with an anomalous high-pressure system located over northern-northwestern Europe and a low in the eastern Mediterranean. This configuration allowed the incursion of cold continental air from the east-northeast into southern Italy. Our results are consistent with similar studies of snowfall in other European and mid-latitude regions of the northern hemisphere.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Modelling snowfall in southern Italy: a historical perspective in the Benevento Valley (1645-2018)

Diodato¹,

Gómara

Bellocchi

2021

Clim. Res.

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“…Again, from 1797 to 1806 the days of snow in Milan (Italy) had been 243 (i.e., 26 on average per year), but the situation had substantially changed from 1857 to 1876 with 166 snow days (i.e., eight snow days per year). Recently, Diodato et al (2020b) provided evidence for Switzerland that this decrease is continuing in the Alpine range.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Multi-Decadal Variability in the Snow-Cover Reconstruction at Parma Observatory (Northern Italy, 1681–2018 CE)

Diodato¹,

Bertolin

Bellocchi

2020

Front. Earth Sci.

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Emerging negative trends in snow depth and cover days highlight the challenges posed by changing snow patterns around the world. They suggest that snowdependent regions in southern Europe could be affected by these changes because the number of days with snow on the ground (DSG) determines soil processes and water-flow in rivers, streams, lakes and reservoirs. We present here the first homogeneous, annually-resolved (from October to April), multi-centennial (1681-2018 CE) DSG time-series for the Parma meteorological observatory (OBS), in northern Italy, which to date is also the longest DSG series reconstructed in the world. DSG data are in fact still poorly documented and misunderstood due to the limited and fragmentary data measurements of the past. DSG recording only began in 1938 at Parma OBS. To generate the long-term annual DSG time-series at the study site, we develop a model consistent with calibration (1938-1990 CE) and validation (1991 samples of observed data. We show that the variability of DSG depends on winter precipitation and air temperature, as well as on winter-spring temperature variability, suggesting that long sequences of DSG are dominated by cold air masses in years with cold weather and high variability. Modeled DSG data show a downward trend from the 19th century, in the transition period from the cold of the Little Ice Age to the warmth of modern times, followed by a more rapid decline in the five most recent decades. The DSG at Parma OBS appear to have followed over the last century trends similar to those observed throughout Eurasia and across the Northern Hemisphere, where a marked decline of snow-cover duration has been reported in the transition seasons (spring and autumn).

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“…N. Imfeld et al: Extreme springs in Switzerland since 1763 studies have extended analyses of daily-based climate indices over several centuries because the necessary temporally complete daily data are rarely available (Brugnara et al, 2022;Diodato et al, 2020;Parker et al, 1992). In particular from a historical perspective, evaluating daily-based indices, such as the occurrence of frost days or the occurrence of the last frost day in spring, can be relevant, as they are often reported in historical documents (Zhang et al, 2011;Pfister et al, 2017).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Extreme springs in Switzerland since 1763 in climate and phenological indices

Imfeld,

Hufkens,

Brönnimann

2024

Clim. Past

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Abstract. Historical sources report manifold on hazardous past climate and weather events that had considerable impacts on society. Studying changes in the occurrence or mechanisms behind such events is, however, hampered by a lack of spatially and temporally complete weather data. In particular, the spring season has received less attention in comparison to summer and winter but is nevertheless relevant, since weather conditions in spring can delay vegetation and create substantial damage due to late-frost events. For Switzerland, we created a daily high-resolution (1 × 1 km2) reconstruction of temperature and precipitation fields from 1763 to 1960 that forms, together with present-day meteorological fields, a 258-year-long gridded data set. With this data set, we study changes in long-term climate and historical weather events based on climate and phenological indices focusing on the spring season. Climate and phenological indices show few changes in the mean during the first 200 years compared to the most recent period from 1991 to 2020, where climate change signals clearly emerged in many indices. We evaluate the climate and phenological indices for three cases of extreme spring weather conditions: an unusually warm spring, two late-frost events, and three cold springs. Warm springs are much more frequent in the 21st century, but a very warm and early spring also occurred in 1862. Spring temperatures, however, do not agree on how anomalously warm the spring was when comparing the Swiss temperature reconstruction with reanalyses that extend back to 1868. The three springs of 1785, 1837, and 1853 were particularly cold, with historical sources reporting, for example, prolonged lake freezing and abundant snowfall. Whereas the springs of 1837 and 1853 were characterized by cold and wet conditions, in the spring of 1785 wet days were below average, and frost days reached an all-time maximum, in particular in the Swiss Plateau, indicating inversion conditions. Such conditions are in line with a high occurrence of northeasterly and high-pressure weather types and historical sources describing Bise conditions, a regional wind in the Alpine area related to inversions. Studying such historical events is valuable, since similar atmospheric conditions can lead to cold springs affecting vegetation growth and agricultural production.

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Reconstruction of snow days based on monthly climate indicators in the Swiss pre-alpine region

Cited by 7 publications

References 66 publications

Modelling snowfall in southern Italy: a historical perspective in the Benevento Valley (1645-2018)

Modelling snowfall in southern Italy: a historical perspective in the Benevento Valley (1645-2018)

Multi-Decadal Variability in the Snow-Cover Reconstruction at Parma Observatory (Northern Italy, 1681–2018 CE)

Extreme springs in Switzerland since 1763 in climate and phenological indices

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