Meteorological Drought and its Relationship with Southern Oscillation Index (SOI)

Drought monitoring, including its severity, spatial, and duration is essential to enhance resilience towards drought, particularly for overcoming drought risk management and mitigation plan. The present study has an objective to examine the suitability of the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) and Percent of Normal Index (PN) on assessing drought event by analyzing their relationship with the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI). The monthly rainfall data over twenty years of the observation period were used as a basis for data input in the drought index calculation. The statistical association analyses, included the Pearson Correlation (r), Kendal tau (τ), and Spearman rho (rs) used to assess the relationship between the monthly drought indexes and SOI. The present study confirmed that the SPI showed a more consistent and regular pattern relationship with SOI basis which was indicated by a moderately high determination coefficient (R2) of 0.74 and the magnitude of r, τ, and rs that were of 0.861, 0.736, and 0.896, respectively. Accordingly, the SPI showed better compatibility than the PN for estimating drought characteristics. The study also revealed that the SOI data could be used as a variable to determine the reliability of drought index results.

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Finescale Evaluation of Drought in a Tropical Setting: Case Study in Sri Lanka

Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology ◽

10.1175/2008jamc1767.1 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 48 (1) ◽

pp. 77-88 ◽

Cited By ~ 10

Author(s):

Bradfield Lyon ◽

Lareef Zubair ◽

Vidhura Ralapanawe ◽

Zeenas Yahiya

Keyword(s):

Sri Lanka ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Drought Indices ◽

Drought Risk ◽

Mitigation And Adaptation ◽

Wide Range ◽

Drought Relief ◽

Drought Indicators ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index

Abstract In regions of climatic heterogeneity, finescale assessment of drought risk is needed for policy making and drought management, mitigation, and adaptation. The relationship between drought relief payments (a proxy for drought risk) and meteorological drought indicators is examined through a retrospective analysis for Sri Lanka (1960–2000) based on records of district-level drought relief payments and a dense network of 284 rainfall stations. The standardized precipitation index and a percent-of-annual-average index for rainfall accumulated over 3, 6, 9, and 12 months were used, gridded to a spatial resolution of 10 km. An encouraging correspondence was identified between the spatial distribution of meteorological drought occurrence and historical drought relief payments at the district scale. Time series of drought indices averaged roughly over the four main climatic zones of Sri Lanka showed statistically significant (p < 0.01) relationships with the occurrence of drought relief. The 9-month cumulative drought index provided the strongest relationships overall, although 6- and 12-month indicators provided generally similar results. Some cases of appreciable drought without corresponding relief payments could be attributed to fiscal pressures, as during the 1970s. Statistically significant relationships between drought indicators and relief payments point to the potential utility of meteorological drought assessments for disaster risk management. In addition, the study provides an empirical approach to testing which meteorological drought indicators bear a statistically significant relationship to drought relief across a wide range of tropical climates.

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Building Drought Index Based on AMSR-E Data - A Case Study in Hilly Area of Central Sichuan Basin

Advanced Materials Research ◽

10.4028/www.scientific.net/amr.781-784.2292 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 781-784 ◽

pp. 2292-2295

Author(s):

Qiong Lian Chen ◽

Jing Wen Xu ◽

Shao Wei Shi ◽

Xin Li ◽

Peng Wang

Keyword(s):

Correlation Analysis ◽

Sichuan Basin ◽

Drought Index ◽

Daily Precipitation ◽

Pearson Correlation ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Ratio Method ◽

Hilly Area ◽

Central Sichuan Basin ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index

Sichuan Hilly Area is selected as the study area. This paper uses ten brightness temperature AMSR-E data during 2006-2010. It constructs 8 preferred drought index by using the polarization ratio method (Polarization Rations, PR). This paper makes Pearson correlation analysis by using the 8 preferred drought index and the soil moisture of study area. Meanwhile, Linear regression and correlation analysis with the Daily precipitation and the standardized precipitation index SPI are also made. The results show: for example, in December 2009, drought index DI74, DI92, DI96 were basically consistent with the spatial distribution. Drought degree has an increasing trend from southeast to northwest regional gradually. And with the drought conditions in hilly area of actual and daily precipitation, SPI correlation between interannual and Sichuan are proper. So the drought index is more suitable for drought study in hilly area of central Sichuan Basin.

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Meteorological Drought Analysis and Return Periods over North and West Africa and Linkage with El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO)

Remote Sensing ◽

10.3390/rs13234730 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 13 (23) ◽

pp. 4730

Author(s):

Malak Henchiri ◽

Tertsea Igbawua ◽

Tehseen Javed ◽

Yun Bai ◽

Sha Zhang ◽

...

Keyword(s):

West Africa ◽

Large Scale ◽

Southern Oscillation ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Joint Probability ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Socioeconomic Impacts ◽

The North ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

The North Atlantic Oscillation

Droughts are one of the world’s most destructive natural disasters. In large regions of Africa, droughts can have strong environmental and socioeconomic impacts. Understanding the mechanism that drives drought and predicting its variability is important for enhancing early warning and disaster risk management. Taking North and West Africa as the study area, this study adopted multi-source data and various statistical analysis methods, such as the joint probability density function (JPDF), to study the meteorological drought and return years across a long term (1982–2018). The standardized precipitation index (SPI) was used to evaluate the large-scale spatiotemporal drought characteristics at 1–12-month timescales. The intensity, severity, and duration of drought in the study area were evaluated using SPI–12. At the same time, the JPDF was used to determine the return year and identify the intensity, duration, and severity of drought. The Mann-Kendall method was used to test the trend of SPI and annual precipitation at 1–12-month timescales. The pattern of drought occurrence and its correlation with climate factors were analyzed. The results showed that the drought magnitude (DM) of the study area was the highest in 2008–2010, 2000–2003, and 1984–1987, with the values of 5.361, 2.792, and 2.187, respectively, and the drought lasting for three years in each of the three periods. At the same time, the lowest DM was found in 1997–1998, 1993–1994, and 1991–1992, with DM values of 0.113, 0.658, and 0.727, respectively, with a duration of one year each time. It was confirmed that the probability of return to drought was higher when the duration of drought was shorter, with short droughts occurring more regularly, but not all severe droughts hit after longer time intervals. Beyond this, we discovered a direct connection between drought and the North Atlantic Oscillation Index (NAOI) over Morocco, Algeria, and the sub-Saharan countries, and some slight indications that drought is linked with the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) over Guinea, Ghana, Sierra Leone, Mali, Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Niger, and Nigeria.

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Relationship between meteorological and hydrological droughts in the upstream regions of the Lancang–Mekong River

Journal of Water and Climate Change ◽

10.2166/wcc.2021.445 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Jiqiu Li ◽

Yinfei Wang ◽

Yungang Li ◽

Wenting Ming ◽

Yunshu Long ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Time Scale ◽

Pearson Correlation ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Mekong River ◽

Propagation Time ◽

Wet Season ◽

Evolution Characteristics ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

The Relationship

Abstract Information on the relationship between meteorological drought (MD) and hydrological drought (HD) can serve as the basis for early warning and mitigation of HD. In this study, the standardized precipitation index and standardized streamflow index were applied to characterize MD and HD, respectively, and the evolution characteristics of MD and HD were assessed in the upstream regions of the Lancang–Mekong River (ULMR) from 1961 to 2015. Furthermore, the relationship between MD and HD was investigated using the Pearson correlation and wavelet analysis. The results revealed that (1) there was no significant change in the annual precipitation and streamflow; however, the ULMR experienced successive alternations of wet and dry episodes; (2) the average duration and magnitude of MD and HD increased with an increase in the time scale, while the duration and magnitude of MD lengthened and amplified in HD; (3) MD more likely propagated to HD as the time scale increased, and the propagation time exhibited marked seasonality, which was shorter in the wet season and longer in the dry season; and (4) there was a positive correlation between MD and HD; these two types of drought exhibited similar resonance frequency and phase-shift characteristics, and HD lagged behind MD.

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Bivariate Assessment of Drought Return Periods and Frequency in Brazilian Northeast Using Joint Distribution by Copula Method

Geosciences ◽

10.3390/geosciences10040135 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 10 (4) ◽

pp. 135 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Rodrigo Lins da Rocha Júnior ◽

Fabrício Daniel dos Santos Silva ◽

Rafaela Lisboa Costa ◽

Heliofábio Barros Gomes ◽

David Duarte Cavalcante Pinto ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Return Period ◽

Probability Distributions ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Bivariate Distribution ◽

Drought Risk ◽

Drought Event ◽

Monthly Precipitation ◽

Copula Functions ◽

Spatially Distributed ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index

The Northeast region of Brazil (NRB) is the most populous semiarid area in the world and is extremely susceptible to droughts. The severity and duration of these droughts depend on several factors, and they do not necessarily follow the same behavior. The aim of this work is to evaluate the frequency of droughts in the NRB and calculate the return period of each drought event using the copula technique, which integrates the duration and severity of the drought in the NRB in a joint bivariate distribution. Monthly precipitation data from 96 meteorological stations spatially distributed in the NRB, ranging from 1961 to 2017, are used. The copula technique is applied to the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) on the three-month time scale, testing three families of Archimedean copula functions (Gumbel–Hougaard, Clayton and Frank) to reveal which model is best suited for the data. Averagely, the most frequent droughts observed in the NRB are concentrated in the northern sector of the region, with an observed duration varying from three and a half to five and a half months. However, the eastern NRB experiences the most severe droughts, lasting for 14 to 24 months. The probability distributions that perform better in modeling the series of severity and duration of droughts are exponential, normal and lognormal. The observed severity and duration values show that, for average values, the return period across the region is approximately 24 months. Still in this regard, the southernmost tip of the NRB stands out for having a return period of over 35 months. Regarding maximum observed values of severity and duration, the NRB eastern strip has the longest return period (>60 months), mainly in the southeastern portion where a return period above 90 months was observed. The northern NRB shows the shortest return period (~45 months), indicating that it is the NRB sector with the highest frequency of intense droughts. These results provide useful information for drought risk management in the NRB.

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Mediterranean-Scale Drought: Regional Datasets for Exceptional Meteorological Drought Events during 1975–2019

Atmosphere ◽

10.3390/atmos12080941 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (8) ◽

pp. 941

Author(s):

Shifa Mathbout ◽

Joan Albert Lopez-Bustins ◽

Dominic Royé ◽

Javier Martin-Vide

Keyword(s):

Drought Index ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Principal Component ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Western Mediterranean ◽

Drought Indices ◽

Drought Event ◽

Evaporative Demand ◽

Atmospheric Circulation Patterns ◽

Dry Conditions

Drought is one of the most complex climate-related phenomena and is expected to progressively affect our lives by causing very serious environmental and socioeconomic damage by the end of the 21st century. In this study, we have extracted a dataset of exceptional meteorological drought events between 1975 and 2019 at the country and subregional scales. Each drought event was described by its start and end date, intensity, severity, duration, areal extent, peak month and peak area. To define such drought events and their characteristics, separate analyses based on three drought indices were performed at 12-month timescale: the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), the Standardized Precipitation Evapotranspiration Index (SPEI), and the Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI). A multivariate combined drought index (DXI) was developed by merging the previous three indices for more understanding of droughts’ features at the country and subregional levels. Principal component analysis (PCA) was used to identify five different drought subregions based on DXI-12 values for 312 Mediterranean stations and a new special score was defined to classify the multi-subregional exceptional drought events across the Mediterranean Basin (MED). The results indicated that extensive drought events occurred more frequently since the late 1990s, showing several drought hotspots in the last decades in the southeastern Mediterranean and northwest Africa. In addition, the results showed that the most severe events were more detected when more than single drought index was used. The highest percentage area under drought was also observed through combining the variations of three drought indices. Furthermore, the drought area in both dry and humid areas in the MED has also experienced a remarkable increase since the late 1990s. Based on a comparison of the drought events during the two periods—1975–1996 and 1997–2019—we find that the current dry conditions in the MED are more severe, intense, and frequent than the earlier period; moreover, the strongest dry conditions occurred in last two decades. The SPEI-12 and RDI-12 have a higher capacity in providing a more comprehensive description of the dry conditions because of the inclusion of temperature or atmospheric evaporative demand in their scheme. A complex range of atmospheric circulation patterns, particularly the Western Mediterranean Oscillation (WeMO) and East Atlantic/West Russia (EATL/WRUS), appear to play an important role in severe, intense and region-wide droughts, including the two most severe droughts, 1999–2001 and 2007–2012, with lesser influence of the NAO, ULMO and SCAND.

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ANALYSIS OF METEOROLOGICAL DATA AND DROUGHT IN THE LOWER NORTHERN PART OF THAILAND

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN INDUSTRY ◽

10.17762/itii.v9i2.371 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 9 (2) ◽

pp. 467-476

Author(s):

Daniel Derajew Demmsie, Et. al.

Keyword(s):

Drought Index ◽

Meteorological Data ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Rain Gauge ◽

Northern Region ◽

Environmental Conservation ◽

Annual Rainfall ◽

Dry Conditions ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index

The study areas include Phitsanulok, Nakhon Sawan and Khamphang Phet. The meteorological data between 1986 and 2015, was collected from the meteorological rain gauge stations situated in the Lower Northern part of Thailand. This study involves the analysis of the meteorological data and drought trends in the northern region of Thailand from 1986 to 2015. The study used the Meteorological Drought Monitor software (MDM) to analyze the drought trends through the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). From this analysis, we then presented the results through graphs representing the trends in meteorological parameters and drought index. The results showed that, the annual rainfall measurement of the regions analyzed continues to reduce consistently as the temperature increase. The drought trends in these provinces observed to considerably lean towards dry conditions. Nakhon Sawan, for instance, experienced extreme drought in 1977(SPI =-2.5) and moderate wetness in 2013. Kampheang Phet recorded moderately wet conditions (SPI =1.5) in 2013 and 2014 years, and near normal conditions (SPI = -1.1) in 1996. Lastly, Phitsanulok was majorly comprised of moderately dry and severely dry, especially for 2015(SPI =-22). From the findings, awareness should be created to foster the need for environmental conservation, besides to improve environmental protection and the levels of precipitation.

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A Global Probabilistic Dataset for Monitoring Meteorological Droughts

Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society ◽

10.1175/bams-d-19-0192.1 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 101 (10) ◽

pp. E1628-E1644

Author(s):

Marco Turco ◽

Sonia Jerez ◽

Markus G. Donat ◽

Andrea Toreti ◽

Sergio M. Vicente-Serrano ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Real Time ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Drought Risk ◽

Climate Data ◽

Probabilistic Information ◽

Single Realization ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Available Information

AbstractAccurate and timely drought information is essential to move from postcrisis to preimpact drought-risk management. A number of drought datasets are already available. They cover the last three decades and provide data in near–real time (using different sources), but they are all “deterministic” (i.e., single realization), and input and output data partly differ between them. Here we first evaluate the quality of long-term and continuous climate data for timely meteorological drought monitoring considering the standardized precipitation index. Then, by applying an ensemble approach, mimicking weather/climate prediction studies, we develop Drought Probabilistic (DROP), a new global land gridded dataset, in which an ensemble of observation-based datasets is used to obtain the best near-real-time estimate together with its associated uncertainty. This approach makes the most of the available information and brings it to the end users. The high-quality and probabilistic information provided by DROP is useful for monitoring applications, and may help to develop global policy decisions on adaptation priorities in alleviating drought impacts, especially in countries where meteorological monitoring is still challenging.

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Evaluation of Extreme Cold and Drought over the Mongolian Plateau

Water ◽

10.3390/w11010074 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 11 (1) ◽

pp. 74 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Zhaofei Liu ◽

Zhijun Yao ◽

Heqing Huang ◽

Batbuyan Batjav ◽

Rui Wang

Keyword(s):

Drought Index ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Drought Indices ◽

Mongolian Plateau ◽

The Past ◽

Extreme Cold ◽

Two Indices ◽

High Consistency ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index

Extreme cold and meteorological drought in the Mongolian Plateau (MP) were investigated during 1969–2017. Several drought indices were evaluated by analyzing recorded historical drought data in the Chinese region of the MP. The evaluated drought indices were then applied to detect drought characteristics in the entire MP. The trends of extreme cold indices showed that the climate of the MP has warmed during the past 49 years; however, the frequency of cold day/night has increased in the Mongolian region. The climate of Mongolia has also become colder in the spring season. The comprehensive meteorological drought index (CMDI) and the standardized precipitation index with a six-month scale (SPI6) exhibited better performances, showing high consistency between the spatial patterns of the two indices. However, drought represented by the SPI6 was enhanced greater than that expressed by the CMDI. Drought in the MP has been enhanced during the past 49 years, particularly in the Ordos and Alashan plateaus and the Xiliao River basin in China. Moreover, drought has been enhanced from August to October, particularly in the Mongolian region. However, spring drought has shown a weakening trend, which has been beneficial for agriculture and husbandry sectors in some regions of the MP.

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Meteorological Drought Index Mapping in Bangladesh Using Standardized Precipitation Index during 1981–2010

Advances in Meteorology ◽

10.1155/2017/4642060 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 2017 ◽

pp. 1-17 ◽

Cited By ~ 13

Author(s):

Md. Anarul Haque Mondol ◽

Iffat Ara ◽

Subash Chandra Das

Keyword(s):

Drought Index ◽

Management Strategies ◽

Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Meteorological Drought ◽

Precipitation Index ◽

Spatiotemporal Variations ◽

Distance Weighted ◽

Index Mapping ◽

The Standardized Precipitation Index ◽

Inverse Distance

Natural disasters are a major concern in Bangladesh, particularly drought which is one of the most common disaster in Bangladesh. Drought needs to be explained spatially to understand its spatiotemporal variations in different areas. In this paper, the meteorological drought has been shown by using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) method and illustrated through the Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW) method across Bangladesh. We used rainfall data of 30 meteorological stations in Bangladesh during the study period of 1981–2010. The results indicate that drought has been fluctuating and it has become a recurrent phenomenon during the study period. The SPI depicted the drought conditions that plunged dramatically in 1981, 1982, 1985, 1987, 1989, 1992, 1994, and 1996 and then gradually improved in 2004, 2006, and 2009 in the country. The present study demonstrated that drought occurred in Bangladesh on an average of 2.5 years. Drought was more prominent in the northern, south-western, and eastern regions in Bangladesh compared to the rest of the areas of the country. The outcomes of the present study will help in during disaster management strategies, particularly drought, by initiating effective plans and adaptation remedies in different areas of Bangladesh.

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