|
Read Full Article (file size: 630392 bytes) Cited by
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH,
VOL. 112,
D15103,
doi:10.1029/2007JD008510,
2007
Doubled length of western European summer heat waves since 1880
P. M. Della-Marta
Institute of Geography, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland Federal Office for Meteorology and Climatology, MeteoSwiss, Zurich, Switzerland Bureau of Meteorology, National Climate Centre, Melbourne, Australia
M. R. Haylock
Climatic Research Unit, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
J. Luterbacher
Institute of Geography, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland National Center of Competence in Research on Climate (NCCR), Bern, Switzerland
H. Wanner
Institute of Geography, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland National Center of Competence in Research on Climate (NCCR), Bern, Switzerland
Abstract
We analyzed a new data set of 54 high-quality homogenized daily maximum temperature series from western Europe (Austria, Belgium,
Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United
Kingdom) to define more accurately the change in extreme warm Daily Summer Maximum Temperature (DSMT). Results from the daily
temperature homogeneity analysis suggest that many instrumental measurements in the late 19th and early 20th centuries were
warm-biased. Correcting for these biases, over the period 1880 to 2005 the length of summer heat waves over western Europe
has doubled and the frequency of hot days has almost tripled. The DSMT Probability Density Function (PDF) shows significant
changes in the mean (+1.6 ± 0.4°C) and variance (+6 ± 2%). These conclusions help further the evidence that western Europe's
climate has become more extreme than previously thought and that the hypothesized increase in variance of future summer temperature
has indeed been a reality over the last 126 years.
Received 5
February
2007;
accepted 16
May
2007;
published 3
August
2007.
Keywords: Climate extremes;
observations;
temperature.
Index Terms: 1616 Global Change: Climate variability (1635, 3305, 3309, 4215, 4513); 3309 Atmospheric Processes: Climatology (1616, 1620, 3305, 4215, 8408); 4215 Oceanography: General: Climate and interannual variability (1616, 1635, 3305, 3309, 4513).
Read Full Article (file size: 630392 bytes) Cited by
Citation: Della-Marta, P. M., M. R. Haylock, J. Luterbacher, and H. Wanner
(2007),
Doubled length of western European summer heat waves since 1880,
J. Geophys. Res.,
112,
D15103,
doi:10.1029/2007JD008510.
Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union.
|