Pavel Zahradníček

• PhD
• Czech Hydrometeorological Institute

Background The increasing threat of fire caused by ongoing climate change requires accurate and timely prediction for the effective management of extreme fire situations. The limited research on the connection between fire danger metrics and the occurrence of wildfires in the forested and agricultural landscapes of the Czech Republic underscores th...

The interaction of large-scale flow and local topography can lead to various meteorological phenomena. A prominent example is foehn, a dry and warm leeward wind. Foehn’s impact on near-surface meteorological parameters and its formation mechanisms have been extensively studied in the Alps and other regions worldwide. However, less attention has bee...

Establishing the link between landslide reactivations and their triggers is one of the key tasks for effective landslide risk assessment. However, to accurately determine the causes of landslides, it is necessary to obtain detailed chronological data on their past occurrences and analyze a larger number of landslides in the area to eliminate local...

Integrated modelling of climate change impacts in the soil–plant–atmosphere system can improve agroecosystem resilience and resource use efficiency. For the research on tomato (Solanum lycopersicum L.), bell sweet peppers (Capsicum annuum L.), and winter oilseed rape (Brassica napus L.), the CSM-CROPGRO-Tomato, CSM-CROPGRO-Papper and CSM-CROPGRO-Ca...

Phenological shifts in wild-growing plants and wild animal phenophases are well documented at many European sites. Less is known about phenological shifts in agricultural plants and how wild ecosystem phenology interacts with crop phenology. Here, we present long-term phenological observations (1961–2021) from the Czech Republic for wild plants and...

Flash floods, characterized by their sudden onset, extreme discharge, short duration, material damage, and human loss, represent a significant natural hazard. Not well covered by standard hydrological observations, flash flood data can primarily be derived from various types of documentary evidence. This evidence served as the main data source for...

Background : The increasing threat of fire caused by ongoing climate change requires accurate and timely prediction for the effective management of extreme fire situations. The limited research on the connection between fire danger metrics and the occurrence of wildfires in the forested and agricultural landscapes of the Czech Republic underscores...

Phenological shifts in wild-growing plants and wild animal phenophases are well documented at many European sites. Less is known about phenological shifts in agricultural plants and how wild ecosystem phenology interacts with crop phenology. Here, we present long-term phenological observations (1961-2021) from the Czech Republic for wild plants and...

Flash floods, characterized by their sudden onset, extreme discharges, short duration, material damage, and human loss, represent a significant natural hazard. Not well covered by standard hydrological observations, flash floods data can primarily be derived from various types of documentary evidence. This evidence served as the main data source fo...

Demographic yearbooks of the Czech Republic, prepared by the Czech Statistical Office for the 1919–2022 period, contain official figures on the number of fatalities attributed to excessive natural cold, excessive natural heat, lightning, natural hazards, air pressure changes, and falls on ice or snow, as well as details about the sex and age of the...

The 2022 summer fire in the Bohemian Switzerland National Park (BSNP) is the largest in the 30-year recorded history of the Czech Republic, with an affected area of over 1000 ha. The FlamMap fire modeling system was used to investigate the fire behavior in the BSNP and to evaluate scenarios under a range of fuel types, fuel moistures, and weather c...

Demographic yearbooks of the Czech Republic, prepared by the Czech Statistical Office for the period 1919–2022, contain official figures for the number, gender, and age of fatalities attributed to excessive natural cold, excessive natural heat, lightning, natural disasters, air pressure changes, and falls on ice or snow, covering a 104-year period...

The paper demonstrates “collaboration” between the stochastic weather generator SPAGETTA (WG) and Regional Climate Models (RCM) in analysing impacts of Climate Change (CC). In the first part of the paper, the generator is compared with the ensemble of 19 RCMs in terms of their ability to reproduce 11 spatial temperature and precipitation indices in...

Recent climate warming is reflected in the advanced onset of spring phenological phases of fruit trees and in so-called false springs. This then manifests as an increased risk of trees being damaged by late frosts in the sensitive growing stage. Based on the homogenised temperature series of 155 climatological stations divided into two altitudinal...

To better understand the impact of climate change at a given location, it is crucial to consider a wide range of climate models that are representative of the area. In this study, we emphasize the importance of the careful validation and selection of climate models most suitable for a particular region. This step is critical to enhance the relevanc...

The 2022 summer fire in Bohemian Switzerland National Park (BSNP) is ranked as the largest in the Czech Republic´s 30-year recorded history, with an affected area over 1000 ha. The FlamMap fire modeling system was used to investigate the fire behavior associated with the BSNP and to evaluate scenarios under a range of fuel types, fuel moistures, an...

Analysis of a long-term temperature variability of mountains has been neglected for a long time. Here we homogenised and reconstructed four temperature series (1961–2020) of selected mountain stations situated above 1000 m representing the area of northern Moravian mountain ridges (the Czech Republic) and their spatiotemporal variability was examin...

Study Region: The Thaya river basin provides multiple water uses in the transboundary region of Lower Austria and Southern Moravia. Due to the low precipitation (P) to reference evapotranspiration (ETo) ratio, the Thaya river basin is among the most sensitive to climate change in the region. Study Focus: The main objective is to understand the cha...

Knowledge of meteorological triggers of mass movements is crucial for determining the degree of hazards, but also for predicting their occurrence. Dendrogeomorphic methods (tree-ring based) have repeatedly provided data on historical landslide activity as a basis for detailed trigger analysis. However, the construction of long den-drogeomorphic chr...

The paper investigates weather-related fatalities over the territory of the Czech Republic in the 100-year period from 1921 to 2020. The unique database, created from documentary evidence (particularly newspapers), includes, for each deadly event, information about the weather event, the fatality itself, and related circumstances. A total of 2729 f...

This paper analyses temperature and snow patterns of winters (December–February) averaged for the territory of the Czech Republic during the 1961–2021 period and their broad environmental impacts and responses. Series of mean, maximum, minimum, absolute maximum and absolute minimum temperatures show significant increasing linear trends, while decre...

Extensive road construction works recently took place in the remote eastern part of the Peruvian Cordillera Blanca, aiming at a better connection of isolated mountain communities with regional administrative centres. Here we document and characterize landslides associated with these road construction efforts in the Río Lucma catchment, Peru. We sho...

The present study analyses 61 years of phenological observations (1961–2021) of five herb, five shrub, four tree, and one bird species representing the prevalent spring species of floodplain forest ecosystems in the Czech Republic, central Europe. The in situ observations were conducted at the Vranovice site (48°48′ N, 16°46′ E, 170 m above mean se...

Fatalities associated with severe weather, collected from newspapers and other documentary sources, were used to create a corresponding database for the 1961–2020 period for the Czech Republic. Fatalities attributed to floods, windstorms, convective storms, snow and glaze ice, frost, fog, and other severe weather, on the one hand, and vehicle accid...

The close relationship between the onset and severity of agricultural and hydrological drought is considered self-evident, yet relatively few studies have addressed the effects of applying agricultural drought adaptation to hydrological drought characteristics. The present study applies a model cascade capable of simultaneously considering the inte...

Increasing drought is considered one of the major threats associated with climate change in central Europe. To provide an objective, quantitative tool that represents current drought conditions, the Czech Drought Monitor System (CzechDM) was established in 2012. Like other drought monitoring systems worldwide, the CzechDM uses several approaches to...

The widely used Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) monthly temperature dataset is available in two formats—non-homogenized and homogenized. Since 2011, this homogenized dataset has been updated almost daily by applying the “Pairwise Homogenization Algorithm” (PHA) to the non-homogenized datasets. Previous studies found that the PHA can pe...

This paper presents the characteristics of extreme temperatures in the Czech Republic, as calculated from homogenized series of daily maximum (TMAX) and daily minimum (TMIN) temperatures recorded by 133 climatological stations throughout the territory in the 1961–2020 period. In general, statistically significant increasing linear trends were recog...

Thirty-year periods are treated in climatology as spans with relatively representative and stable climatic patterns, which can be used for calculating climate normals. Annual and seasonal series of circulation types were used to compare two 30-year sub-periods, 1961–1990 and 1991–2020, the second one being strongly influenced by recent global warmi...

Many studies in Europe have investigated the relationship between climatological variables and circulation patterns expressed by various classifications of circulation types. This study provides new insights based on an analysis of precipitation in the western (Bohemia—BOH) and eastern (Moravia and Silesia—M&S) parts of the Czech Republic with resp...

The occurrence of major wildfires in countries such as Portugal, Italy and Spain (2017) and Sweden (2018) indicated that wildfires pose a risk across Europe. While Central Europe has not been at the center of such events, observed climate data and climate projections suggest a tendency toward more years with wet and warm winters and dry and hot sum...

The European drought of 1921 is assessed in terms of its impacts on society and in terms of its physical characteristics. The development of impacts of the drought are categorized by a systematic survey of newspaper reports from five European newspapers covering the area from England to the Czech Republic and other parts of Europe. This is coupled...

Satisfactory requirements for the spatial resolution of climate and the influences of soil data in defining the starting points, endings, and the intensities of droughts have become matters of discussion in recent years. The overall inclusiveness of the modelling tools applied is also frequently discussed. In this light, five model setups (MSs) of...

This study analyses long‐term changes in drought indices (Standardised Precipitation Index—SPI, Standardised Precipitation–Evapotranspiration Index—SPEI) at 1 and 3 months scales at 182 stations in 11 central and eastern European countries during 1949–2018. For comparative purposes, the necessary atmospheric evaporative demand (AED) to obtain SPEI...

Climate warming is having profound effects on the hydrological cycle by increasing atmospheric demand, changing water availability, and snow seasonality. Europe suffered three distinct heat waves in 2019, and 11 of the 12 hottest years ever recorded took place in the past two decades, which will potentially change seasonal streamflow patterns and l...

This paper presents an analysis of fatalities attributable to weather conditions in the Czech Republic during the 2000–2019 period. The database of fatalities deployed contains information extracted from Právo, a leading daily newspaper, and Novinky.cz, its internet equivalent, supplemented by a number of other documentary sources. The analysis is...

Landslides or landslide-induced impact waves in high mountain lakes represent a high hazard for society, calling for realistic assessments of rock slope stability responsible for the process chain initiation. This task is often hampered by complex interplays of triggers, which effects on slope stability may be delayed by decades or even millennia,...

Landslides or landslide-induced impact waves in high mountain lakes represent a highhazard for society, calling for realistic assessments of rock slope stability responsible forthe process chain initiation. This task is often hampered by complex interplays of triggers, which effects on slope stability may be delayed by decades or even millennia, wh...

The European drought of 1921 is assessed in terms of its impacts on society and in terms of its physical characteristics. The development of impacts of the drought are categorized by a systematic survey of newspaper reports from five European newspapers covering the area from England to the Czech Republic and other parts of Europe. This is coupled...

The paper shows a large-scale shift in agroclimatic zones in the territory of the Czech Republic (CR) between 1961 and 2019. The method used for agroclimatic zoning took advantage of high-resolution (0.5 km × 0.5 km) daily climate data collected from 268 climatological and 787 rain-gauge stations. The climate information was combined with soil and...

This paper presents a comprehensive spatiotemporal analysis of precipitation patterns over the territory of the Czech Republic for the 1961–2019 period. Monthly, seasonal and annual series of precipitation totals and numbers of precipitation days were calculated for four altitudinal groups and the entire Czech Republic, based upon the daily precipi...

Grasslands play a significant role in livestock fodder production and thus, contribute to food security worldwide while providing numerous additional ecosystem services. However, how agroclimatic conditions and adverse weather events relevant for grasslands will change across the European grassland areas has not been examined to date. Using a singl...

This paper presents an analysis of fatalities attributable to weather conditions in the Czech Republic during the 2000–2019 period. The database of fatalities deployed contains information extracted from Právo, a leading daily newspaper, and Novinky.cz, its internet equivalent, supplemented by a number of other documentary sources. The analysis is...

Recent drought and a surge in days with weather conditions conducive to wildfire occurrence during 2015–2019 reminded the Czech Republic that it is not immune to this type of natural hazard. Although Central Europe has not been at the center of such events, observed climate data and climate projections suggest a tendency toward more years with wet...

Among the variables that can be employed to characterize agricultural drought, soil drought is of particular importance. This contribution uses gridded soil‐drought values calculated from the SoilClim model for the 1961–2019 period to analyse soil drought episodes (based on the 10th percentile) in four lowlands, relatively homogeneous regions in ce...

The introduction of automatic instruments for precipitation measurements may have resulted in some differences in results from those taken by previous manual instruments. In the station network of the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute (CHMI) this replacement process began in the 1990s, when precipitation measurements taken by the METRA 886 rain g...

This paper presents a comprehensive trend analysis of spatiotemporal temperature change patterns over the territory of what is now the Czech Republic (CR) during the 1961–2019 period. Employing daily mean temperatures (TAVG), maximum (TMAX) and minimum (TMIN) temperatures and diurnal temperature range (DTR), supplied by 133 stations of the Czech Hy...

Evaporation from open water surfaces is often estimated based on the pan evaporation (Epan), which is an essential measure for estimating atmospheric evaporative demand. Within the Central European region, Epan appears to be slightly underestimated in the case of the hydrological balance of water bodies. In the context of the recent multi-year peri...

The Kinzl Glacier is a unique dendritic-type glacier of the Peruvian Cordillera Blanca and is surrounded by well-developed Little Ice Age (LIA) moraines. Based on field observations and analysis of historical photographs (since 1932) and remotely sensed images (since 1948), we interpret distinct mechanisms of landslides in these moraines and link t...

Weather diaries constitute an important source of data for historical climatology The poster presents the daily weather records kept by the Reverend Šimon Hausner from Buchlovice in south east Moravia (Czech Republic), covering the 1803-1831 period (Brázdil et al. 2019).

One of the most disastrous windstorms to take place over the Czech Lands occurred on the night of 26/27 October 1870. It is here analysed through the use of documentary data (narrative sources, newspapers, forestry journals, printed documents) and systematic meteorological observations (wind force and direction). ombining this evidence with informa...

Monthly, seasonal and annual wind-speed series from 119 meteorological stations in the Czech Republic indicate significant decreasing trends in the period 1961-2015. Attribution analysis, applying multiple linear regression, was used to identify wind-speed components related to natural and anthropogenic climate forcings and internally induced clima...

Changes of instruments often give rise to significant break-points in wind-speed series. This is particularly applicable when measurements are automated, a process that started in the Czech Republic in the mid-1990s, when standard universal anemographs were progressively replaced by the Vaisala WAA251 sensor (cup anemometer) and the WS425 sensor (u...

This contribution analyses the spatio-temporal variability of mean daily wind speeds (MDWSs) over the territory of the Czech Republic in the 1961–2015 period, using series from the 119 meteorological stations of the Czech Hydrometeorological Institute. These series were quality-controlled and homogenised by application of the Standard Normal Homoge...

It is very likely that the intensity of precipitation over land in the middle latitudes is going to increase by 2100.This chapter deals with the comparison between measured (1981–2010) and simulated (2010–2100) three-day precipitation totals across the area of the Czech Republic. The future precipitation totals were calculated on the basis of five...

A drought of exceptional severity took place in Central Europe in 1947, with marked socio-economic consequences and far-reaching political responses in the Czech Lands. A rich body of meteorological observations from the Czech Lands is drawn upon to construct a comprehensive picture of the various direct and indirect factors that led to this extrem...

An increase in drought frequency, duration and severity is expected for the Central European region as a direct consequence of climate change. This will have profound effects on a number of key sectors (e.g. agriculture, forestry, energy production and tourism) and also affect water resources, biodiversity and the landscape as a whole. However, glo...

The end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century in the Czech Republic were characterized by frequent extreme water cycle fluctuations, i.e. the occurrence of increased incidences of flood and drought events. Drought occurs irregularly in the Czech Republic during periods with low precipitation amounts. The most noteworthy droughts...

The timing of maturity of grapes depends on the weather conditions during the growing season. This study relies on the dependence of harvest dates on the air temperature and dry/wet conditions. Recorded observations show that increases in air temperature and dryness are associated with earlier grape harvests. Documentary data of grape harvests from...

This contribution employs instrumental records to analyse the temporal and spatial variability of monthly, seasonal and annual maximum wind gusts (MWGs) in the Czech Republic. The development of an observation network capable of measuring wind gusts, the possible technical weaknesses of wind measurements and problems with establishing homogeneity i...

The response of field-grown vegetables to adverse weather conditions is strongly coupled to the timing of adverse events, the sensitivity of the growth stage of the impacted crop and the management actions that are taken. To estimate the long-term yield response to changes in temperature and precipitation as well as the short-term response to key a...

El estudio se centra en los perjuicios causados por las sequías sobre los cultivos en las regiones bajas de la República Checa. Grandes pérdidas en los cultivos se han atribuido a las sequías, a menudo en combinación con el calor y otros tipos de estress. El objetivo de este trabajo fue investigar el efecto de las sequías cuantificado mediante el Í...

This chapter describes results of pilot actions in Prague. Two different pilot areas were selected (Legerova street and Bubny-Holesovice quarter) with different modelling approach. Finally, the Green belt around Prague is studied as well. Different scenarios are tested and their results discussed. The matter of air quality is also analysed.

Climatological analyses of hailstorms, as phenomena of local or regional occurrence with associated damage, depend strongly on the quality and density of meteorological observations. Documentary sources, both historical and modern, including insurance company records, can be used to complement existing meteorological data or extend them into the pe...

Sucho se v posledních letech stává klimatickým extrémem, který se v České republice objevuje s větší intenzitou a vyšší frekvencí. Aby bylo možné i přes tento fakt provozovat konkurenceschopné zemědělství, je nutné mít k dispozici základní informace o aktuálním stavu sucha a krátkodobé předpovědi. Cílem této práce je proto představit Integrovaný sy...

The purpose of our research is to simulate the influence of the thermal properties of land surface on the Central European climate in the 21st century. The simulation is carried out with calculation of Gorczynsky and Conrad continentality indexes, respectively, as a function of annual temperature range. Seven different ENSEMBLES models (ARPEGE, CNR...

We investigate future climate conditions projected by six regional climate model (RCM) simulations forced by SRES A1B emission scenario. As a diagnostic tool of the climate change we use Köppen-Geiger climate classification that is suitable to assess the climate change impacts on ecosystems. The analysis is based on the comparison of Köppen-Geiger...

Shallow landslides are fairly frequent natural processes which emerge as a result of both rainfall and rapid snowmelt in the Flysch Belt of the Outer Western Carpathians. We estimated the total water content thresholds for the previously defined seven phases of increased landsliding which took place between 1939 and 2010 around the Napajedla meteor...

Central Europe is generally not considered a drought-prone region compared with, for example, the Mediterranean. However, Central Europe, including the Czech Republic, recently experienced a series of drought events with substantial impacts, especially on crop production. Because agriculture systems, and vegetation in general, have adapted to evenl...

This study deals with agroclimatic assessment of variability of the growing season length for sugar beet cultivation over the period 1961-2013 in Central Bohemia. For the purpose of the analysis, the number of favourable days during sowing, germination, and final harvest periods was identified. In the decade 1961-1970 the growing season was shorter...

The paper deals with the Prague Heat Island, the climatic phenomena typical for all big cities. The attention is paid to its size, respectively intensity; presented is also the time evolution in the last 50 years and the expected development until the half of the next decade. Next to it, the biometeorological aspect of the phenomena is also mention...

The weather conditions from August 2011 to May 2012 produced an extreme drought in the eastern Czech Republic (Moravia), whereas the patterns were nearly normal in its western region (Bohemia). The Southern and Central Moravia regions, which represent the most important agricultural areas, were most affected by the drought. The precipitation totals...

Various types of studies require a sufficiently long series of data processed identically over the entire area. For climate analysis, it is necessary that analysed time series are homogeneous, which means that their variations are caused only by variations in weather and climate. Unfortunately, most of the climatological series are inhomogeneous an...

Soil moisture dynamics and their temporal trends in the Czech Republic are forced by various drivers. The methodology of applying remotely sensed data with both high temporal and spatial resolutions provides detailed insight and objective quantification of the causes of changes in soil moisture patterns. Our analysis of temporal trends indicates th...

Using the monthly means of air temperatures at 267 stations in the Czech Republic, the long-term change has been estimated at each station for the last 50 years. Annual mean temperatures for the whole country show a considerable increase, more pronounced than that for global temperature, however, supplemented by strong fluctuations from year to yea...

Among the key problems associated with the study of climate variability and its evolution are identification of the factors responsible for observed changes and quantification of their effects. Here, correlation and regression analysis are employed to detect the imprints of selected natural forcings (solar and volcanic activity) and anthropogenic i...

The Carpathians are the longest mountain range in Europe and a geographic barrier between Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and the Balkans. To investigate the climate of the area, the CARPATCLIM project members collected, quality-checked, homogenized, harmonized, and interpolated daily data for 16 meteorological variables and many derived indicators...

This study has, for the first time, analyzed the potential impacts of climate change on damaging frost during growing season of vegetable crops at a high horizontal resolution of 10 x 10 km in the Bohemian Plateau. The main objective of this study was to assess the potential changes in the timing of the last spring frost, the first autumn frost for...

This paper addresses droughts in the Czech Lands in the 1090–2012 AD period, basing its findings on documentary evidence and instrumental records. Various documentary sources were employed for the selection of drought events, which were then interpreted at a monthly level. While the data on droughts before 1500 AD are scarce, the analysis concentra...