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Contrasting behavior of July 2021 floods in Western Europe and Central China revealed by GRACE Follow-On ranging data
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  • Haosi Li,
  • Shuang Yi,
  • Ziren Luo,
  • Peng Xu
Haosi Li
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Shuang Yi
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences

Corresponding Author:s.yi@ucas.ac.cn

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Ziren Luo
Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Peng Xu
Institute of Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
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Abstract

The conventional monthly resolution of global gravity products from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) and its successor GRACE Follow-On (GFO) greatly impedes their application to transient extreme climate events like floods. Nevertheless, this study utilizes the line-of-sight gravity difference between the twin GFO satellites, reflecting the instantaneous surface mass changes below, to obtain water mass changes at a resolution of days. This study investigates two floods in July 2021 in Western Europe and Central China (CC), respectively, and the high-resolution results present the temporal progression of the floods up to a maximum of about 40 Gt. However, the GFO-derived water gain in CC is much lower than expected. We speculate that intense human manipulation of water resources mitigated the repercussions of the flood in CC. This study presents the feasibility of GFO application in fast-evolving climate events and highlights the effectiveness of countermeasures by humans to flood hazards.
05 Jan 2023Submitted to ESS Open Archive
17 Jan 2023Published in ESS Open Archive