Climate reanalysis provides new data for science software

Science software in climatic disciplines could become more fully featured in the future thanks to reanalysis of old weather data.

An international team working on the 20th Century Reanalysis Project has recompiled some of the most significant information from the past 140 years.

Events like the US Dust Bowl, caused by overuse of water resources from the Colorado River leading up to the 1930s, can now be modelled to determine what went wrong in rainfall estimates.

Dr Gil Compo, lead author on the project report published in the Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, explains how the new dataset created for modern science software draws from a broad array of historical information sources.

"Producing this huge dataset required an international effort to collate historical observations and recordings from sources as diverse as 19th century sea captains, turn of the century explorers and medical doctors," the researcher says.

The Royal Meteorological Society notes that, at present, flooding due to rising river levels can be forecasted, but flooding due to severe rainfall on to saturated land cannot be estimated as accurately, making it much more dangerous.