News Archive

05.06.2024

Warm welcome to our two new PhD Students and goodbye to Jérôme Kopp

Welcome to our two new PhD students, Firdewsa and Margaret. Firdewas is joining us after completing her Master's degree at ETH Zurich. She will work on the project's impact-based warnings of surface water floods with the Mobiliar Lab for Natural Risks. Conversely, Margaret joins us after completing her Master's degree in applied statistics at Memorial University of Newfoundland, Canada. Her focus is combining indirect hail information from rada, lightning data, hail reports from the public, and data from hail sensors. Her goal is to create a posteriori hail footprint map and visualize the results so they are interpretable for stakeholders. Furthermore, Jérôme Kopp passed his Devense and is leaving us for a position as Project Manager Wind & Ice at Meteotest AG. All the best, Jérôme!

01.05.2024

Warm welcome to our new masterstudents

We welcome our new master's students, Sandro Beer, Marina Ganci, and Melina Abeling. Sando Beers investigates the underlying drivers behind changes in supercell occurrence and intensity within the Alpine area. Marina is focussing on classifying Mediterranean cyclones based on the stationarity of their tracks and analyzing selected quasi-stationary ones for their large-scale drivers and surface impacts. Meanwhile, Melina is looking at the performance of the hail growth model HAILCAST.

30.04.2024

Sum up EGU24

Several group members presented their work at the European Geoscience Union (EGU) General Assembly 2024, which took place from 14-19 April on-site and online in Vienna

02.04.2024

Swiss Global Change Day 2024

Our master students, Nicolas Hartmann, and Sandro Beer, participated in the 24th Swiss Global Change Day (SGCD24) at Freies Gymnasium Bern on April 2, 2024. Nicolas was presenting his poster about characterizing heatwaves in the northern hemisphere, whereas Sandro's poster was about identifying drivers behind future changes in supercell occurrence in Europe.

28.02.2024

Warm welcome to our two sabbatical visitors from the the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Please join us in warmly welcoming our two esteemed sabbatical guests, Sonia Lasher-Trapp and Jeff Trapp, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Both are distinguished professors in the Department of Climate, Meteorology, and Atmospheric Sciences. They will focus on crafting an event-level climate-change attribution methodology throughout their stay, drawing from the PGW climate modeling approach. Furthermore, they will showcase the practical application of this methodology through an analysis of a severe hailstorm event in Switzerland. We look forward to their valuable contributions during their stay with us. Please don't hesitate to ask if you have any inquiries or seek further information about their project.

18.09.2023

Warm welcome to our new masterstudent and goodbye to our former ones

We welcome our new climate sciences master's student, Sonia Flückiger. Her thesis will be about radar datasets and ground-based hail observation. On the other hand, three of our master's students passed their master's defence. Congratulations, Joas Müller, Stella Bērziņa and Andrea Angelidou! Joas and Stella are going to be PhD candidates at ETH Zurich. Andrea will do an internship. We wish you all the best for your future!

02.05.2023

Warm welcome to our new PostDoc and master students

From the first of May 2023, three new members joined our research group. Monika Feldmann is starting as a PostDoc. Claudia Pusch and Nicolas Hartmann will write their master's thesis in our group. We wish you all a good start!

24.02.2023

Warm welcome to our new PostDoc's and Scientific employee

In the last month, our two new postdocs have started their research in our Unit—a warm welcome to Edgar Dolores and Alice Portal. Edgar is focussing on Atmospheric blocking in storm-resolving climate models. Alice's project will contribute to the MEDCYCLONES COST action with a systematic climatological analysis linking multivariate hazards (compound events) to Mediterranean cyclones and large-scale climate drivers. Severin Kaderli is joining us as a scientific employee. We wish you all a good start!

06.02.2023

How a EUSF storyline paper turned into a “story”

The RECEIPT climate story explorer allows you to explore storylines that show the indirect impact of climate change on the European Union. As much of the wealth and many of the products that are eaten or used in the EU are produced or sourced in the rest of the world, climate change impacts the EU not only directly, but also through impact on remote regions. With this application, we can build and show stories to highlight several of these climate impact hotspots. One specific paper on Hotspot description in Oversea Overseas Territories with the title: "Can tropical cyclones hitting the EU outermost regions compromise the stability of the European Union Solidarity Fund (EUSF)?" by Alessio Ciullo (Institute for Environmental Decisions, ETH Zurich), Olivia Martius (Institute of Geography and Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research, University of Bern), Erik Strobel (Department of Economics and Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research) and David N. Bresch (Swiss Federal Office of Meteorology and Climatology MeteoSwiss) was just implemented recently.

21.11.2022

Swiss Geoscience Meeting 2022

Some of our group members presented their research together with members from the Climatology Group at the 20th Swiss Geosciences Meeting. The Swiss Geoscience Meeting offers good opportunities for exchange and networking, interesting talks and posters and also good to get insight into other topics. Furthermore, Pauline Rivoire, a former PhD of our group, was also presenting her new research.

11.11.2022

Warm welcome to our new PhD candidates

Lena Wilhelm, Hugo Banderier, Martin Aregger and Duncan Pappert have started their PhD's in our group either this or last semester. Lena will be focussing on the variability of hail in Switzerland, Hugo is analysing persistent jet states in the massive CEMS-LENS2 dataset. Martin is working on hail nowcasting potential of Differential Reflectivity columns and Duncan will be focussing on the PERSIST-EUROPE project, which seeks to get a better understanding of the dynamical processes controlling persistent flow conditions over Europe in summer for their relation to extreme weather events. Warm welcome and we wish you a great start!

10.11.2022

Master's degree completed and off to new positions in our group

Tamara Baumann and Christoph von Matt, our two former Master's students, are now working as research assistants. Have a good start in your new position!

01.09.2021

Welcome to our group!

Alicia Engelmann, Michael Herrmann, Severin Kaderli and Mehdi Mattou have joined our group to complete their Master's Thesis. A warm welcome and we wish you a great start!

01.07.2021

Welcome to our group!

Eirini Boleti joined our group as a PostDoc researcher, focusing her work on the impact of hail on car insurance losses and how to implement/communicate hail research to students. Welcome to Bern and to the Climate Impacts group, Eirini!

22.04.2021

Next week is EGU 2021 !

Several members of our group will present their work at the European Geoscience Union (EGU) General Assembly 2021, Online Gather (vEGU21). As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt our daily lives, EGU is organising its General Assembly as a fully virtual conference for the second time.

Here are all contributions (2' presentations) by order of appearance :

• On Tuesday Apr-27 16:19–16:21, Alexandre Tuel et al. will present "A global perspective on the sub-seasonal clustering of precipitation extremes".
• On Tuesday Apr-27 13:59–14:01, S. Mubashshir Ali et al. will present "Recurrent Rossby wave packets and persistent extreme weather".
• On Thursday Apr-29 13:45–13:47, Alessio Ciullo et al. will present "A feasibility study of a global risk pool scheme against tropical cyclones".
• In the same session, at 14:05–14:07, Jérôme Kopp et al. will present "A novel method to identify subseasonal clustering episodes of extreme precipitation events and their contribution to large accumulations".
• In the same session, at 14:07–14:09, Yannick Barton et al. will present "On the subseasonal clustering of European extreme precipitation events and its relationship to large-scale atmospheric drivers".
• Also on Thursday Apr-29, at 14:20–14:22, Olivia Romppainen-Martius et al. will present "Local and remote Southern Hemisphere extratropical circulation responses to soil moisture anomalies in Australia".
• Last but not least, on Friday Apr-30 11:25–11:27, Pauline Rivoire et al. will present "A comparison of moderate and extreme ERA-5 daily precipitation with two observational data sets".

17.01.2021

CE 2021 talks are now online !

All talks of the Workshop on Compound Weather and Climate Events that took place on 13 – 15 January 2021 at University of Bern were recorded and are now available at the <a href="https://www.oeschger.unibe.ch/recordings_ce2021">workshop webpage</a>.

01.12.2020

Welcome to our group!

Alexandre Tuel joined our group for a PostDoc, focusing his work on future projections of temporal clustering of extreme precipitation events. Welcome to Bern and to the Climate Impacts group, Alexandre!

30.11.2020

AGU Fall Meeting 2020!

Several members of our group will present their work at one of the world's largest virtual scientific conferences, the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall Meeting 2020 scheduled from 1-17 December.

Here are all contributions by order of appearance :

• On Tuesday Dec-15, Olivia Martius's implication in the research on compound events contributed to a poster presentation by Kai Kornhuber et al. on "Evaluating the dependence structure of compound precipitation and wind speed extremes".
• On Tuesday Dec-15, Olivia Martius et al. will give a talk on "Local and remote Southern Hemisphere extratropical circulation responses to soil moisture anomalies in Australia". In this study, they explore how Rossby waves respond to different soil moisture anomalies in Australia.
• In the same session, Mubashshir Ali et al. will give a presentation on "Recurrent Rossby wave packets and their effect on dry and wet spells".
• Also on Tuesday Dec-15, Pauline Rivoire et al. will demonstrate the usage of the EGPD to characterize daily extreme precipitation with a poster on "ERA-5 Daily Precipitation Compared with Observational Datasets ".
• In the same session, Martina Kauzlaric et al. will attempt to answer the question "Cherry-picking rainfall events from ensemble reforecast archives: what flood events the current climate didn’t show us (yet)?" with a poster on simulated precipitation events from ECMWF forecast products.
• Last but not least, Alexandre Tuel et al. will present ...

11.05.2020

We "went" to EGU 2020!

Several members of our group presented their work at the European Geoscience Union (EGU) General Assembly 2020. Of course, due to Covid-19, none could be physically present. However, the contributions have brought about fruitful conversations online and we would like to share the displays here with you!

Here are all contributions by order of appearance :

• On Monday, Margreth Keiler et al. showed with "Understanding risk and resilience in alpine communities: A conceptual model for coupling human and landscape systems" a first attempt to develop a conceptual model of a coupled human-landscape system in Swiss Alpine communities.
• On Wednesday, Olivia Martius et al. presented "Local and remote Rossby wave responses to an anomalously dry or wet Australian continent". In this study, they explore how Rossby waves respond to different soil moisture anomalies in Australia.
• In the same session, Mubashshir Ali et al. opened the question "Are Recurrent Rossby wave packets linked to persistent extreme weather events in the Southern Hemisphere?". See Mubashshir's presentation for the answer!
• Later that morning, Pauline Rivoire et al. demonstrated the usage of the EGPD to characterize daily extreme precipitation in "Characterization of ERA5 daily precipitation using the extended generalized Pareto distribution".
• On Wednesday afternoon, Mattia Brughelli et al. presented the "Damage simulator - a tool to explore the effects of flood risk drivers on the development of flood damage in Switzerland".
• Olivia's implication in the research on compound events contributed to Jakob Zscheischler et al.s' display "A typology of compound weather and climate events".
• Thursday was highlighted by Alessio Ciullo et al.'s presentation "A downward counter-factual climate risk analysis of the impact of tropical cyclones in the Caribbean islands" in which Alessio suggests for instance to perform a worst-case analysis study to support climate risk management planning.
• Last but not least, Andrey Martynov et al. presented on Friday with "Simulated hailstorms over Switzerland in May 2018 in current and future climate conditions" the particularities of the hailstorms that occurred in Switzerland during May 2018 and the simulations thereof.

01.03.2020

Welcome to our group!

Tamara Baumann and Jan Liechti have joined our group to complete their Master's Thesis. A warm welcome and we wish you a great start!

01.12.2019

Welcome to our group!

Alessio Ciullo joined our group for a PostDoc, working for the H2020 project REmote Climate Effects and their Impact on European sustainability, Policy and Trade (RECEIPT). Welcome to Bern and to the Climate Impacts group, Alessio!

17.04.2018

Welcome to our group!

We are happy to announce that since the beginning of this year, two people have joined our group. Thomas Rölli is writing a Master's Thesis with the title "Calibration of Climada-Landslide model" and Martin Aregger is doing his Bachelor's Thesis on the simulation of present and future hailstorms in Switzerland.

23.11.2019

A new automatic flood warning system for Switzerland

We are excited to present a new publication "Developing an Automated Medium-Range Flood Awareness System for Switzerland Based on Probabilistic Forecasts of Integrated Water Vapor Fluxes" published in Weather and Forecasting. In this project, our former group member Irina Mahlstein developed, in collaboration with MeteoSwiss, an automatic flood warning system based on atmospheric flood precursors.

Reference: Mahlstein, I., J. Bhend, C. Spirig, and O. Martius, 2019: Developing an Automated Medium-Range Flood Awareness System for Switzerland Based on Probabilistic Forecasts of Integrated Water Vapor Fluxes. Wea. Forecasting, 34, 1759–1776, https://doi.org/10.1175/WAF-D-18-0189.1

10.09.2019

A method for real‐time temporal disaggregation of blended radar–rain gauge precipitation fields

We are happy to announce that Yannick Barton's work on temporally disaggregating blended radar - rain gauge precipitation fields was published today in the RMetS (Meteorological Aplications). The radar-based precipitation field (A) is dilated (B) and further extended through coloured stochastic noise (C). The resulting precipitation fields are visible on the MeteoSwiss App's precipitation animation.

Reference: Barton, Y, Sideris, IV, Germann, U, Martius, O. A method for real‐time temporal disaggregation of blended radar–rain gauge precipitation fields. Meteorol Appl. 2019; 1– 14. https://doi.org/10.1002/met.1843

01.09.2019

Welcome to our group!

Today, we are happy to announce the beginning of three new Master's Projects. Martin Aregger is coming back to our group and is working on stationary convective thunderstorms. Jérôme Kopp has joined us to study the temporal clustering of heavy precipitation and Marco Planzer is studying the role of building characteristics for the vulnerability to hail. We wish them a great Master's Thesis year!

28.08.2019

The Swiss Population is reporting hail observations

We are excited to present a new publication "Experiences with >50,000 Crowdsourced Hail Reports in Switzerland" published in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. In this publication, we present the MeteoSwiss App crowd-sourced hail reports, how we filtered them and show a comparison with two radar-based hail algorithms POH (probability of hail) and MESHS (maximum expected severe hail size). The reports presented in this publication are freely available for research purposes.

Reference: Barras, H., A. Hering, A. Martynov, P. Noti, U. Germann, and O. Martius, 2019: Experiences with >50,000 Crowdsourced Hail Reports in Switzerland. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 100, 1429–1440, https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0090.1

09.08.2019

The Local Effect of Northern Hemisphere Atmospheric Blocks on the Persistence of Summer Hot and Dry Spells

How do stationary high-pressure systems (also known as atmospheric blocks) affect the persistence of hot and dry-spells that co-occur with atmospheric blocks in the Northern Hemisphere? This question is being answered in this most recent publication by Matthias Röthlisberger and Olivia Martius, published in AGU's Geophysical Research Letters.

Reference: Röthlisberger, M., & Martius, O. (2019).Quantifying the local effect of NorthernHemisphere atmospheric blocks on thepersistence of summer hot and dryspells.Geophysical Research Letters,46,10,101–10,111. https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL083745

01.08.2019

Welcome to our group!

Today we are happy to announce several new arrivals: Andreas Zischg, Stefan Schürmann, Markus Mosimann, Martina Kauzlaric and Pascal Horton, some as members of the Mobiliar Lab for Natural Risks, transferred to our group from the former Hydrology group. They will continue their projects within the frame of our group.

07.05.2019

Welcome to our group!

We welcome the Master's Students Samuel Ehret and Thomas Lanz who have joined our group for their thesis.

03.05.2019

Atmospheric blocks modulate the odds of heavy precipitation events in Europe

A new article written in our group was published online today, finding that "Atmospheric blocks modulate the odds of heavy precipitation events in Europe". In this study, Sina discovered for example, that moderately extreme 5-day precipitation events in Winter in the Alpine area are more likely to occur while the western North-Atlantic sector is blocked with a high-pressure system.

Reference: Lenggenhager, S., Martius, O. Atmospheric blocks modulate the odds of heavy precipitation events in Europe. Clim Dyn 53, 4155–4171 (2019) https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-019-04779-0

31.01.2019

Welcome to our group!

A warm welcome to, Simon Schick and Sina Lenggenhager who have joined our group for a (further) few months!

30.01.2019

Monography on Extratropical Cyclones

Today, a new AMS Meteorological Monography on extratropical cyclone was published online. Olivia Martius participated in writing this chapter that describes the history of scientific inquiry into the structure, evolution, and dynamics of extratropical cyclones, their constituent fronts, and their attendant jet streams and storm tracks.

Reference: Schultz, D.M., L.F. Bosart, B.A. Colle, H.C. Davies, C. Dearden, D. Keyser, O. Martius, P.J. Roebber, W.J. Steenburgh, H. Volkert, and A.C. Winters, 2018: Extratropical Cyclones: A Century of Research on Meteorology’s Centerpiece. Meteorological Monographs, 59, 16.1–16.56, https://doi.org/10.1175/AMSMONOGRAPHS-D-18-0015.1

10.10.2018

Welcome to our group!

We are pleased to announce new members in our group! Christoph von Matt has started his Master's Thesis in September, Pauline Rivoir and Mubashshir Ali have now started their PhDs, Tim Raupach, Marco Rohrer have joined us for PostDocs and Matthias Röthlisberger will be with us for another few months as a PostDoc.

17.04.2018

Welcome to our group!

We are happy to announce that since the beginning of this year, two people have joined our group. Thomas Rölli is writing a Master's Thesis with the title "Calibration of Climada-Landslide model" and Martin Aregger is doing his Bachelor's Thesis on the simulation of present and future hailstorms in Switzerland.