Three millennia of heavy rainfalls in Western Mediterranean: frequency, seasonality and atmospheric drivers

Corella, Juan Pablo; Valero‐Garcés, Blas L.; Vicente‐Serrano, Sergio M.; Brauer, Achim; Benito, Gerardo

doi:10.1038/srep38206

Cited by 85 publications

(95 citation statements)

References 55 publications

(74 reference statements)

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“…Our results are in agreement with other palaeohydrological studies in the area for the same period (Benito et al, 2010;Machado et al, 2011) highlighting a tendency from many regions to increase the frequency of large floods and extreme hydro-meteorological events during transition periods of rapid climate change (Knox, 2000;Macklin et al, 2006). During the onset and termini of the Medieval Warm Period and in some decades of the Little Ice Age, major flooding increased their frequency in the western Mediterranean (Benito et al, 2015a;Corella et al, 2016). During the wetter phases of late 19 th century, major flooding occurred in all seasons, while in the second half of the twentieth century, from AD 1945 to AD 1973, more than 70% of extreme floods are linked to autumn rain patterns with high inter-annual variability (Benito et al, 2010).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Modelling the Hydro‐Sedimentary Dynamics of a Mediterranean Semiarid Ungauged Watershed Beyond the Instrumental Period

2017

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The development of reliable tools to quantify long‐term sediment budgets is critical to establish adequate environmental and management policies in semiarid Mediterranean regions. In this study, we apply a multidisciplinary methodology to estimate water and sediment yields in ungauged Mediterranean watersheds over a period of scarce instrumental data (i.e. second half of 19th and first half of 20th centuries). Runoff and precipitation reconstructions have been obtained using an integrative approach involving synoptic reanalysis models, regional climatic datasets, historical archives and palaeoflood proxies from natural archives. The resulting hydrological reconstruction has been implemented on a hydro‐sedimentary distributed model (i.e. TETIS) to understand the hydro‐sedimentary dynamics in the studied watershed. We highlight that, in our study area, regional‐data (instrumental, historical and sedimentary) based models show higher accuracy in the sediment yield and runoff reconstruction than synoptic reanalysis climate models. The modelled sedimentary dynamics for the studied period respond to a complex interplay between human activities and climate variability. During the 19th century deforestation and grazing activities combined with higher frequency on extreme runoff events resulted in higher runoff and sediment yield in the period 1863–1900. Over the 20th century, reduced precipitation and land abandonment led to a decrease in erosion rates and sediment yield although increased in 1945–1960 coinciding with a period of higher frequency of heavy rainfalls. This hydrological response to climate and human activities in the study watershed improves our understanding of plausible future trends of environmental degradation in small Mediterranean watersheds under different land use and climate change scenarios. This article includes supporting information which features an explanation of GILMCLIM downscaling model, The precipitation series resulting from the reanalysis data (Figure S1), an analysis of the different precipitation series used (Table S1) and an extensive explanation of how the relation between Puentes and Valdeinfierno reservoirs was considered. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 92%

Modelling the Hydro‐Sedimentary Dynamics of a Mediterranean Semiarid Ungauged Watershed Beyond the Instrumental Period

2017

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“…(, ) identified a pulse of storm‐related aeolian activity in the neighbouring coast of Portugal at 1·2 ka cal bp , corresponding to the Rapid Climate Change event of 1·0 to 1·2 ka cal bp (Mayewski et al ., ). Increased storm activity has also been detected in the coastal sedimentary archives of the English Channel and Brittany (north‐west France) (Sorrel et al ., ; Van Vliet‐Lanoë et al ., ,b) and in the lacustrine records of the Mediterranean Iberian region (Corella et al ., ; Sánchez‐López et al ., ) at this time interval, which roughly corresponds to the Dark Ages Cold Event (DA)/Medieval Climatic Anomaly (MCA) transition. A combination of high tides and storm surges in the north‐east Atlantic under this favourable palaeoclimatic situation could explain the breaching of the outlet channel and the catastrophic erosive event in Doniños.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Costas et al (2012Costas et al ( , 2016 identified a pulse of storm-related aeolian activity in the neighbouring coast of Portugal at 1Á2 ka cal BP, corresponding to the Rapid Climate Change event of 1Á0 to 1Á2 ka cal BP (Mayewski et al, 2004). Increased storm activity has also been detected in the coastal sedimentary archives of the English Channel and Brittany (north-west France) Van Vliet-Lano€ e et al, 2014a,b) and in the lacustrine records of the Mediterranean Iberian region (Corella et al, 2016;S anchez-L opez et al, 2016) (2015). Black circles correspond to control age samples.…”

Section: Long-term Low-frequency Patterns Of Environmental Change In mentioning

confidence: 95%

Formation and evolution of back‐barrier perched lakes in rocky coasts: An example of a Holocene system in north‐west Spain

et al. 2018

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Coastal back‐barrier perched lakes are freshwater bodies that are elevated over sea‐level and are not directly subjected to the inflow of seawater. This study provides a detailed reconstruction of the Doniños back‐barrier perched lake that developed at the end of a small river valley in the rocky coast of the north‐west Iberian Peninsula during the Holocene transgression. Its sequence stratigraphy was reconstructed based on a core transect across the system, the analyses of its lithofacies and microfossil assemblages, and a high‐resolution radiocarbon‐based chronology. The Doniños perched lake was formed ca 4·5 ka bp. The setting of the perched lake was favoured by Late Holocene sea‐level stabilization and the formation of a barrier and back‐barrier basin, which was contemporaneous with the high systems tract period. This basin developed over marine and lagoonal sediments deposited between 10·2 ka bp and 8·0 ka bp, during rapidly rising sea‐level characteristic of the transgressive systems track period. At 1·1 ka bp, the barrier was breached and the perched lake was partially emptied, causing the erosion of the back‐barrier basin sediments and a significant sedimentary hiatus. Both enhanced storminess and human intervention were likely to be responsible for this event. After 1 ka bp, the barrier reclosed and the present‐day lake was reformed, with the water level reaching as high as 5 m above mean sea‐level. The depositional evolution of the Doniños system serves as a model of coastal back‐barrier perched lakes in coastal clastic systems that have developed over gently seaward‐dipping rugged substrates at small distances from the shoreline and under conditions of rising sea‐level and high sediment supply. A review of estuaries, back‐barrier lagoons, pocket beaches and back‐barrier perched lakes in the rocky coast of north‐west Spain shows that the elevation of the bedrock is the main factor controlling the origin and evolution of these systems.

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“…Changes in the frequency of severe weather events determine the occurrence of damaging hydrological events (Diodato et al, 2019;Petrucci et al, 2019), which in turn affect many natural and human systems (Corella et al, 2016;Sofia et al, 2017). Modeling rainfall intensity can help to quantifying the effect of these extreme phenomena that involve complex landscape and ecosystem scenarios within multiple event feedback forms (e.g., Thomas, 2001;Mulligan and Wainwright, 2013;Harris et al, 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Communicating Hydrological Hazard-Prone Areas in Italy With Geospatial Probability Maps

Diodato¹,

Borrelli

Panagos

et al. 2019

Front. Environ. Sci.

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The recurrence of storm aggressiveness and the associated erosivity density are detrimental hydrological features for soil conservation and planning. The present work illustrates for the first time downscaled spatial pattern probabilities of erosive density to identify damaging hydrological hazard-prone areas in Italy. The hydrological hazard was estimated from the erosivity density exceeded the threshold of 3 MJ ha −1 h −1 at 219 rain gauges in Italy during the three most erosive months of the year, from August to October. To this end, a lognormal kriging (LNPK) provided a soft description of the erosivity density in terms of exceedance probabilities at a spatial resolution of 10 km, which is a way to mitigate the uncertainties associated with the spatial classification of damaging hydrological hazards. Hazard-prone areas cover 65% of the Italian territory in the month of August, followed by September and October with 50 and 30% of the territory, respectively. The geospatial probability maps elaborated with this method achieved an improved spatial forecast, which may contribute to better land-use planning and civil protection both in Italy and potentially in Europe.

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Three millennia of heavy rainfalls in Western Mediterranean: frequency, seasonality and atmospheric drivers

Cited by 85 publications

References 55 publications

Modelling the Hydro‐Sedimentary Dynamics of a Mediterranean Semiarid Ungauged Watershed Beyond the Instrumental Period

Modelling the Hydro‐Sedimentary Dynamics of a Mediterranean Semiarid Ungauged Watershed Beyond the Instrumental Period

Formation and evolution of back‐barrier perched lakes in rocky coasts: An example of a Holocene system in north‐west Spain

Communicating Hydrological Hazard-Prone Areas in Italy With Geospatial Probability Maps

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