Publication

Journal	Climate of the Past Discussions
Page(s)	1 - 21
Title of proceedings	Climate of the Past Discussions
DOI	10.5194/cp-2019-17

URL	http://doi.org/10.5194/cp-2019-17
Type of Open Access	Publisher (Gold Open Access)

Abstract. Historians and historical climatologists have long pointed to an increased flood frequency in Central Europe in the mid and late 19th century. However, the causes have remained unclear. Here, we investigate the changes in flood frequency in Switzerland based on long time series of discharge and lake levels, of precipitation and weather types, and based on climate model simulations, focusing on the warm season. Annual series of peak discharge or maximum lake level, in agreement with previous studies, display increased frequency of floods in the mid 19th century and decreased frequency after the Second World War. Annual series of warm-season mean precipitation and high percentiles of 3-day precipitation totals (partly) reflect these changes. A daily weather type classification since 1763 is used to construct flood probability indices for the catchments of the Rhine in Basel and the outflow of Lake Lugano, Ponte Tresa. The indices indicate an increased frequency of flood-prone weather types in the mid 19th century and a decreased frequency in the post-war period, consistent with a climate reconstruction that shows increased (decreased) cyclonic flow over Western Europe in the former (latter) period. To assess the driving factors of the detected circulation changes, we analyse weather types and precipitation in a large ensemble of climate model simulations forced with observed sea-surface temperatures. In the simulations, we do not find an increase in flood-prone weather types in the Rhine catchment in the 19th century, but a decrease in the post-war period related to the sea-surface temperature anomalies.