Compound extreme events in Yarlung Zangbo River Basin from 1977 to 2018

Extreme climate events threaten human health, economic development, and ecosystems. Many studies have been conducted on extreme precipitation and temperature changes in the Yarlung Zangbo River Basin (YZRB). However, little attention has been paid to compound climate extremes. In this study, the variations of wet/warm compound extreme events in summer and dry/cold compound extreme events in winter over the past 42 years in the YZRB were investigated using eight extreme climate indices that were estimated using monthly temperature and precipitation observations. The results showed that the numbers of frost days and ice days tended to decrease on the spatiotemporal scale, while the maximum values of daily maximum temperature and daily minimum temperature exhibited increasing trends. The frequency of wet/warm compound extreme events was significantly higher from 1998 to 2018 than from 1977 to 1997. Dry/cold compound extreme events became less frequent from 1998 to 2018 than from 1977 to 1997. The rate of increase of wet/warm compound extreme events was about ten times the absolute rate of decrease of dry/cold compound extreme events. With regard to the spatial pattern, the frequency of wet/warm compound extreme events increased significantly in almost all parts of the YZRB, while that of dry/cold compound extreme events decreased across the basin. This study helps to improve our understanding of the changes in compound precipitation and temperature extremes in the YZRB from a multivariable perspective.