Heat wave flash droughts in decline
Open accessAbstract
Flash drought is a term that was popularized during rapidly evolving droughts in the Central U.S. in 2012 that were associated with heat waves. We posit that there are two kinds of flash droughts, and we will focus on heat wave flash droughts, of which the 2012 events were typical. We find, based on an analysis of temperature observations and model‐reconstructed soil moisture (SM) and evapotranspiration from 1916 to 2013, that heat wave flash droughts in the conterminous U.S. (CONUS) are most likely to occur over the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest during the growing season. We also find that the number of such events across the CONUS has been decreasing over the last century but rebounded after 2011. The long‐term downward trends appear to be associated with generally increasing trends in SM resulting from increasing trends in precipitation over the areas where heat wave flash droughts are most likely to occur.
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Droughts usually evolve relatively slowly, posing difficulties in identifying their onset and end, although rapid onset of flash droughts is also possible.
“Droughts usually evolve relatively slowly, posing difficulties in identifying their onset and end (64), although the rapid onset of flash droughts is also possible (65).”
From Restoring Degraded Lands (2021) · cites this paper as [65]
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Otkin, J. A., Svoboda, M., Hunt, E. D., Ford, T. W., Anderson, M. C., Hain, C., & Basara, J. B. (2018) · Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society · doi:10.1175/bams-d-17-0149.1 · Cited by 689 · see citing works
Arneth, A., Olsson, L., Cowie, A., Erb, K.-H., Hurlbert, M., Kurz, W. A., Mirzabaev, A., & Rounsevell, M. D. A. (2021) · Annual Review of Environment and Resources · doi:10.1146/annurev-environ-012320-054809 · Cited by 106 · see citing works
“Droughts usually evolve relatively slowly, posing difficulties in identifying their onset and end (64), although the rapid onset of flash droughts is also possible (65).”
Background
- Authors
- Mo, K. C., & Lettenmaier, D. P.
- Affiliations
- National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (US)
- University of California, Los Angeles (US)
- Corresponding author
- Mo, Kingtse C.
- Venue
- Geophysical Research Letters
- Publisher
- American Geophysical Union (AGU)
- Published
- 2015-04-24
- Volume
- 42
- Issue
- 8
- Pages
- 2823-2829
- ISSN
- 0094-8276 (ISSN-L)
- 1944-8007
- OpenAlex
- W2117992507
- Cited by
- 330
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 41 · 2025: 40 · 2024: 52 · 2023: 39 · 2022: 43 · 2021: 41 · 2020: 21 · 2019: 19 · 2018: 12 · 2017: 12 · 2016: 7 · 2015: 2
- FWCI
- 9.01
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Geophysical Research Letters (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- NOAA (GC14-189A)
- University of California, Los Angeles (NA14OAR4310293)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Hydrology and Drought Analysis
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate variability and models
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Plant Water Relations and Carbon Dynamics
- Keywords
- flash drought, heat waves, soil moisture, evapotranspiration, long-term trends, precipitation trends, growing season, central United States, Midwestern United States, Pacific Northwest, 2012 drought
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