The Greek heatwaves of 1987 and 1988

Giles, Brian D.; Balafoutis, Christos

doi:10.1002/joc.3370100507

Cited by 42 publications

(36 citation statements)

References 9 publications

(4 reference statements)

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…Heat waves are a familiar feature of the Mediterranean summer (Colacino and Conte, 1995;Giles and Balafoutis, 1990;Matzarakis and Mayer, 1997;Karakostas and Gawith, 1994;Metaxas and Kallos, 1980;Prezerakos, 1978Prezerakos, , 1989, and several anomalous warm summers have occurred in the Mediterranean and in southern Europe over the last 50 years, with hot events of different intensities and lengths. These events have a high cost in terms of damage to agriculture, forest-fires, and, also, in terms of human health and death loss (Kovats et al, 2004;Meehl et al, 2000;World Health Organization, 2003).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Heat waves in the Mediterranean: a local feature or a larger‐scale effect?

Baldi

Dalu

Maracchi

et al. 2006

Intl Journal of Climatology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We analyse the anomalously warm summer months in the Mediterranean region using the 850 hPa temperature, T850, extracted from the ERA-40 reanalysis, in order to find how these anomalies are related to the anomaly of the jet stream over the Euro-Atlantic area. In this region, the westerly jet has two main branches: the Scandinavian jet and the Mediterranean jet, which, in summer, are at a meridional minimum distance.In addition, we analyse the heat waves in the Central Mediterranean in the last half century using the temperature observations collected at fifty surface stations distributed throughout the Italian peninsula and its two major islands, and we relate these events to the position of the Mediterranean jet.We find that, when these two jets are almost aligned, there is a streak of the Mediterranean jet over the Alps and, to the south of them, an anticyclonic vorticity aloft, which forces a strong subsidence and an adiabatic warming of the troposphere over the Mediterranean. This configuration is also a characteristic of anomalously warm spells over the basin. While, when the Mediterranean jet resides further south and along the northern rim of Africa, its meridional distance from the Scandinavian jet is relatively large, the vorticity over the Mediterranean is cyclonic and this region is relatively cool. The tropospheric temperature difference between these two configurations (Mediterranean jet over the Alps and jet over North Africa) is of the order of 3°C.Since the correlation between the observed temperatures over Italy and the ERA-40 T850 in the Central Mediterranean is more than 90%, and more than 60% in the T850 of the entire Mediterranean basin, we conclude that the heat waves over Italy are representative of exceptionally warm episodes over the Central Mediterranean, and that a warm spell over Italy is a country-scale symptom of warm spells in the Mediterranean basin.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Heat waves in the Mediterranean: a local feature or a larger‐scale effect?

Baldi

Dalu

Maracchi

et al. 2006

Intl Journal of Climatology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Heat waves are difficult to define; no general meteorological definition exists (Giles & Balafoutis 1990). They typically occur on synoptic scales and are often associated with the development of large stationary or quasi-stationary high pressure systems in the extratropics.…”

Section: Heat Wave Indicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The highest heat wave frequency was obtained in 1990, with 4 heat waves (17 to 24 February, 15 to 21 March, 30 April to 7 May and 30 July to 4 August), consisting of a total of 29 d. The well-known 1976 heat wave is conspicuous. It corresponds to the longest (16 d persistence) and most intense event over the 1961-1990period (HW_I 1976 = 75 degree-days, corresponding to a mean daily intensity of 4.7°C above thresholds). It was, however, less intense than the 12 consecutive days of the August 2003 record-breaking heat wave, which showed a mean daily threshold exceedance of 7.3°C.…”

Section: Heat Wave Indicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Heat waves across Europe by the end of the 21st century: multiregional climate simulations

Koffi¹,

Koffi²

2008

Clim. Res.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We investigated changes in the frequency, duration and intensity of heat wave (HW) events between the 20th and 21st centuries, as simulated across Europe by different regional climate models (RCMs). Based on local climate and on calendar day thresholds, the HW indices studied allow a consistent analysis across Europe and throughout the year. Simulations for 2 emission scenarios of greenhouse gases and for 4 model chains, consisting of 3 RCMs, driven by 2 global climate models (GCMs), were considered. Over the 1961-1990 period, the models reproduce fairly well the spatial distribution of fixed exceedance thresholds of the daily maximum temperature (t max ), although not the magnitude. On the other hand, they are qualitatively and quantitatively effective at reproducing the observed behaviour of the HW indices. Changes in t max and in the HW indices were then studied. Because of changes in both the mean and in the variability of t max , the heat waves simulated for the future (2071-2100) across Europe are more frequent, more severe and they last longer. Their intensity and frequency increase by at least a factor of 3, with highly differing patterns, depending on season and location. Thus, the increase in heat wave days observed across large parts of Europe during the last 30 yr is expected to continue (winter) or even accelerate (summer) to the end of this century. The boundary conditions are the main source of uncertainty, whereas differences between RCMs driven by the same GCM are small. KEY WORDS: Heat wave indices · Climate change · Regional climate models · EuropeResale or republication not permitted without written consent of the publisher

show abstract

“…Aunque existen métodos más complejos para determinar el confort térmico en espacios exteriores, que requieren mayor cantidad de variables, el índice de disconfort de Thom (DEOSTHALI, 1999) es un método eficaz y sencillo avalado por diversos trabajos (CLARKE et al, 1971;GILES et al, 1990;UNGER, 1999).…”

Section: Evaluación De Las Condiciones De Confort Térmico De Los Casounclassified

Morfología forestal y confort térmico en "ciudades oasis" de zonas áridas

Correa¹,

Ruiz²,

Cantón³

2010

Ambient. constr.

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Resumensualmente, las ciudades insertas en contextos áridos o semiáridos muestran un modelo de desarrollo urbano basado en la compacidad de formas como estrategia bioclimática para el control de la radiación solar. La ciudad de Mendoza, Argentina; también inserta en un contexto semiárido, presenta un modelo urbano diferente. El mismo está definido por calles anchas y edificios contenidos en una trama en damero rodeada en sus límites por líneas de árboles que conforman túneles verdes. En este modelo, la estrategia de sombra se materializa a través de la estructura vegetal. Para éstas ciudades de zonas áridas, denominadas "oasis", es importante analizar en profundidad el efecto de las diferentes especies forestales y sus configuraciones sobre el balance térmico de los cañones urbanos. En este trabajo se evalúa el comportamiento térmico y el grado de confort alcanzado en canales viales típicos de la trama urbana de baja densidad, forestados con especies de segunda magnitud en condición de homogeneidad y heterogeneidad, durante el verano. Los resultados muestran que los comportamientos térmicos observados y el grado de confort responden claramente a las características de crecimiento y desarrollo de las configuraciones forestales evaluadas y su vinculación con los recursos climáticos y la forma edilicia de la ciudad. Palabras

show abstract

The Greek heatwaves of 1987 and 1988

Cited by 42 publications

References 9 publications

Heat waves in the Mediterranean: a local feature or a larger‐scale effect?

Heat waves in the Mediterranean: a local feature or a larger‐scale effect?

Heat waves across Europe by the end of the 21st century: multiregional climate simulations

Morfología forestal y confort térmico en "ciudades oasis" de zonas áridas

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About