The winter of 2010 registered the most extreme negative value of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) index since the beginning of systematic instrumental records. The anomalous pressure gradient in the North Atlantic region steered a large number of low pressure systems via an unusually southern path, directly influencing Iberia and northern Africa. Large areas of Iberia-especially those located in the western and the southern sectors-registered their historical maxima in winter precipitation, storms were more frequent and severe than usual, and there was a high number of days with weather types prone to cause precipitation. In addition, the most extreme daily precipitation episodes were recorded during the days with the strongest negative NAO index. Our article just published in Climate Research provides an assessment of the outstanding characteristics of the anomalous precipitation occurrence in the winter of 2010 over the Iberian Peninsula, as well as on the associated atmospheric driving mechanisms. Global climate models for the 21st century indicate that strong negative NAO winters with conditions similar to the ones of 2010 may be expected in the future.
The article has been published in Climatic Research, and it is been released with an open access license. Climate Research is published by Inter-Research Science Center, and is a leading journal in the fields of Climatology and Meteorology.
Reference: Vicente-Serrano S.M., Trigo R.M., López-Moreno J.I., Liberato M.L.R., Lorenzo-Lacruz J., Beguería S., Morán-Tejeda E., El Kenawy A. 2001. The 2010 extreme winter North Atlantic Oscillation in Iberian Precipitation: anomalies, driving mechanisms and future projections. Climate Research 46, 51–65, doi: 10.3354/cr00977.
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