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Weather warning archives reveal spatio-temporal hot spots of compound natural hazards

Yang, Wei ; Olsson, Jonas LU ; Berg, Peter and Simonsson, Lennart (2025) In Scientific Reports 15(1).
Abstract

Individual natural hazards may be combined in different ways, leading to cascading or co-occurring effects, turning them into compound hazards. However, assessment of individual as well as compound hazards is often hampered by short or incomplete observational records of actual hazards, and records of various hazards that do not easily combine. In this study we propose an alternative way to detect potential risk of compound natural hazards via archived severe weather warnings. We investigate weather warnings in Sweden from 2011 to 2020 regarding their distributions and frequencies in time (at daily level) and space (at warning district level) from both an individual and compound perspective. We illustrate the methodology and results by... (More)

Individual natural hazards may be combined in different ways, leading to cascading or co-occurring effects, turning them into compound hazards. However, assessment of individual as well as compound hazards is often hampered by short or incomplete observational records of actual hazards, and records of various hazards that do not easily combine. In this study we propose an alternative way to detect potential risk of compound natural hazards via archived severe weather warnings. We investigate weather warnings in Sweden from 2011 to 2020 regarding their distributions and frequencies in time (at daily level) and space (at warning district level) from both an individual and compound perspective. We illustrate the methodology and results by focusing on compound flood-related risk, generated by combinations of heavy rainfall, high streamflow and high sea level, and contextualize with two actual compound flood events in Sweden. We find compound fluvial and coastal flood risk primarily along the southwest coast during the winter half year as well as compound fluvio-pluvial flood risk during the summer half year. The results show that severe weather warnings can be used to assess the frequency and compounding nature of natural hazards, as well as to identify actual cases for further investigation, and we encourage similar investigations elsewhere.

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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
author
; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Scientific Reports
volume
15
issue
1
article number
13330
publisher
Nature Publishing Group
external identifiers
  • pmid:40247027
  • scopus:105003090439
ISSN
2045-2322
DOI
10.1038/s41598-025-96842-6
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
e8eb5568-5336-42e6-b7a5-07de7f9ed513
date added to LUP
2025-07-15 10:43:13
date last changed
2025-07-16 03:00:10
@article{e8eb5568-5336-42e6-b7a5-07de7f9ed513,
  abstract     = {{<p>Individual natural hazards may be combined in different ways, leading to cascading or co-occurring effects, turning them into compound hazards. However, assessment of individual as well as compound hazards is often hampered by short or incomplete observational records of actual hazards, and records of various hazards that do not easily combine. In this study we propose an alternative way to detect potential risk of compound natural hazards via archived severe weather warnings. We investigate weather warnings in Sweden from 2011 to 2020 regarding their distributions and frequencies in time (at daily level) and space (at warning district level) from both an individual and compound perspective. We illustrate the methodology and results by focusing on compound flood-related risk, generated by combinations of heavy rainfall, high streamflow and high sea level, and contextualize with two actual compound flood events in Sweden. We find compound fluvial and coastal flood risk primarily along the southwest coast during the winter half year as well as compound fluvio-pluvial flood risk during the summer half year. The results show that severe weather warnings can be used to assess the frequency and compounding nature of natural hazards, as well as to identify actual cases for further investigation, and we encourage similar investigations elsewhere.</p>}},
  author       = {{Yang, Wei and Olsson, Jonas and Berg, Peter and Simonsson, Lennart}},
  issn         = {{2045-2322}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{1}},
  publisher    = {{Nature Publishing Group}},
  series       = {{Scientific Reports}},
  title        = {{Weather warning archives reveal spatio-temporal hot spots of compound natural hazards}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-96842-6}},
  doi          = {{10.1038/s41598-025-96842-6}},
  volume       = {{15}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}