Innovative trend analysis of spatial and temporal rainfall variations in Umiam and Umtru watersheds in Meghalaya, India
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Innovative trend analysis of spatial and temporal rainfall variations in Umiam and Umtru watersheds in Meghalaya, India Jeffrey Denzil K. Marak 1
&
Arup Kumar Sarma 1 & Rajib Kumar Bhattacharjya 1
Received: 15 July 2020 / Accepted: 13 September 2020 # Springer-Verlag GmbH Austria, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Meghalaya is known to receive the most torrential rainfall in the world, but the region suffers from water shortage as soon as the rain recedes, and the dry season starts. Changes in rainfall patterns and distribution can have a profound impact on water availability in a watershed, and therefore, examining spatial and temporal variations in rainfall is essential. However, the longterm rainfall variations in Meghalaya are not well explored. In this study, we take up two important watersheds in Meghalaya, i.e. Umiam and Umtru watersheds, to study the spatial and temporal rainfall variations. Using the gridded rainfall data from the Indian Meteorological Department from 1901 to 2018, we show that annual, winter, pre-monsoon, and monsoon rainfall is decreasing, whereas the post-monsoon rainfall is increasing. We use the innovative trend analysis (ITA) method to identify the trends in low-, medium-, and high-intensity rainfall. We find that low- and medium-intensity rainfall is in decreasing trend while high-intensity rainfall is increasing across annual and seasonal time scales. Lastly, we cross-check the trends detected using the innovative trend analysis method with a widely accepted Mann-Kendall (MK) test. We find that the results obtained by using the two methods generally concur; however, the ITA can detect non-monotonic trends in different rainfall intensities and is more sensitive to hidden patterns than the MK test.
1 Introduction According to the IPCC (2018), climate change in the latter half of the 21st century will have a significant impact on human lives, assets, and ecosystems from extreme weather events such as heat waves, extreme precipitation, drought and associated wildfires, and coastal flooding. Among these calamities, floods and droughts are the most damaging natural phenomenon that causes loss of life and degrades the economy, nature, and property worldwide. With the consistent rise Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00704-020-03383-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Jeffrey Denzil K. Marak [email protected] Arup Kumar Sarma [email protected] Rajib Kumar Bhattacharjya [email protected] 1
Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati, Guwahati 781039, India
in the level of greenhouse gases, the downwelling infrared radiation gets enhanced, resulting in increased global mean temperatures. It has been observed that global mean temperatures have been increasing since the pre-industrial period and 2015–2019 recorded the warmest period since records began in 1850 (World Meteorology Organization 2019). The rise in temperature enhances evapo
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