Adverse Weather Events

Adverse weather events encompass a spectrum of atmospheric phenomena that pose hazards to life, property and the environment. They range from large-scale extratropical cyclones and tropical storms to convective outbreaks such as hailstorms and tornadoes, as well as compound extremes combining high winds with intense rainfall. Drivers include natural atmospheric dynamics—baroclinic instability in mid-latitudes, convective available potential energy in the tropics—and modulating factors such as sea-surface temperatures and land–surface conditions. Under a warming climate, shifts in jet-stream patterns, intensified moisture loading and altered storm tracks are projected to change the frequency, intensity and geographical distribution of these events. Societal vulnerability is shaped by population density, infrastructure resilience and preparedness measures. Understanding the physical mechanisms, anticipating future changes and integrating hazard, exposure and vulnerability into risk management frameworks are essential for improving early warning, adaptation and loss-reduction strategies across diverse regions.

Research from Nature Portfolio

Recent studies have employed multi-model climate ensembles to quantify the future intensification and increased societal impact of extratropical windstorms across northern and central Europe. Under high-emission scenarios, the meteorological severity index for windstorms more than doubles, and population-weighted impacts more than triple, despite partial mitigation through adaptation of damage thresholds. Analyses of newly recovered eighteenth- and nineteenth-century barometric records reveal that historical storminess in the English Channel peaked both in winter and across all seasons in earlier periods. These reconstructions show a distinct shift toward exclusively winter-time extremes since the 1990s, highlighting sensitivity to natural forcing and greenhouse-gas warming. Deep-analysis of rare low-altitude mobile-radar observations of tornadoes has demonstrated that the strongest winds occur within tens of metres of the surface. Conventional measurements above 100 m systematically underestimate near-ground gusts, with implications for structural design and hazard assessment in tornado-prone regions.

Research from all publishers

High-resolution convection-permitting simulations over the UK and Ireland reveal a fourfold increase by the late twenty-first century in storms producing simultaneous wind and rainfall extremes. Enhanced moisture, strengthened jet-streams and dynamical shifts in cyclone tracks drive the rise in compound footprints of wind‐severity and rain‐severity indices. A new hazard and exposure atlas for European winter storms combines fine-scale wind-speed modelling with spatially detailed land-use and population data to derive representative severity metrics for forested, urban and populated areas. By distinguishing hazard potential from evolving exposure, the atlas offers a sector-specific basis for targeted risk management and evaluation of protective measures. Analyses of North Atlantic storm tracks based on reanalysis data since 1979 show a significant upward trend in explosive cyclone wind maxima of 0.3 m s⁻¹ per decade, accelerating over the last twenty years. Diagnostics link increases to stronger meridional temperature gradients, jet-stream interactions and moisture convergence, supporting mechanism-based seasonal forecasting of extreme surface winds.

Adverse Weather Events publication trend

The graph below shows the total number of articles in adverse weather events across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).

Technical terms

Extratropical cyclone: A large low-pressure system in mid-latitudes driven by horizontal temperature contrasts and baroclinic instability.

Tornadogenesis: The process by which a rotating convective updraft (mesocyclone) produces a ground-touching vortex.

Storm track: The preferred pathway of cyclonic systems guided by upper-level winds and jet-stream configurations.

Compound extremes: The co-occurrence or sequential occurrence of multiple hazards—such as high winds and heavy rainfall—within a single weather system.

Hazard-exposure atlas: A geospatial dataset combining modelled hazard intensity fields with detailed exposure information to map risk distribution.

References

1. Introducing a new hazard and exposure atlas for European winter storms. The Science of The Total Environment (2024).
2. Compound wind and rainfall extremes: Drivers and future changes over the UK and Ireland. Weather and Climate Extremes (2024).
3. Future increased risk from extratropical windstorms in northern Europe. Nature Communications (2023).
4. The seasonal characteristics of English Channel storminess have changed since the 19th Century. Communications Earth & Environment (2024).
5. The strongest winds in tornadoes are very near the ground. Communications Earth & Environment (2023).
6. Increasing risks of the explosive extratropical cyclones over the North Atlantic storm track: a perspective from their surface wind maxima. Environmental Research Letters (2024).