Articles | Volume 28, issue 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-833-2024
https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-28-833-2024
Research article
 | 
21 Feb 2024
Research article |  | 21 Feb 2024

What controls the tail behaviour of flood series: rainfall or runoff generation?

Elena Macdonald, Bruno Merz, Björn Guse, Viet Dung Nguyen, Xiaoxiang Guan, and Sergiy Vorogushyn

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Revised manuscript accepted for HESS
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Cited articles

Basso, S., Schirmer, M., and Botter, G.: On the emergence of heavy-tailed streamflow distributions, Adv. Water Resour., 82, 98–105, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.advwatres.2015.04.013, 2015. a, b, c
Basso, S., Merz, R., Tarasova, L., and Miniussi, A.: Extreme flooding controlled by stream network organization and flow regime, Nat. Geosci., 16, 339–343, https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-023-01155-w, 2023. a
Bernardara, P., Scherzer, D., Sauquet, E., Tchiguirinskaia, I., and Lang, M.: The flood probability distribution tail: how heavy is it?, Stoch. Env. Res. Risk A., 22, 107–122, 2008. a
Bertola, M., Viglione, A., Vorogushyn, S., Lun, D., Merz, B., and Blöschl, G.: Do small and large floods have the same drivers of change? A regional attribution analysis in Europe, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 25, 1347–1364, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-25-1347-2021, 2021. a
Brunner, M. I., Swain, D. L., Wood, R. R., Willkofer, F., Done, J. M., Gilleland, E., and Ludwig, R.: An extremeness threshold determines the regional response of floods to changes in rainfall extremes, Communications Earth & Environment, 2, 1–11, https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00248-x, 2021. a, b, c, d
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Short summary
In some rivers, the occurrence of extreme flood events is more likely than in other rivers – they have heavy-tailed distributions. We find that threshold processes in the runoff generation lead to such a relatively high occurrence probability of extremes. Further, we find that beyond a certain return period, i.e. for rare events, rainfall is often the dominant control compared to runoff generation. Our results can help to improve the estimation of the occurrence probability of extreme floods.