In this enlightening episode, we are joined by Dr. Felsche who explores the pressing issue of prolonged heat periods that have become a prominent feature of European climate. Despite their recurrence, knowledge about the dominant spatial patterns of heatwaves and their impact on moisture-related processes remains sparse. Dr. Felsche discusses how gaining insights into these patterns could significantly improve heatwave and drought prediction, and thus lead to effective mitigation strategies.

He describes how they used hierarchical agglomerative clustering to determine nine dominant spatial heatwave patterns based on a 50-member regional climate model (Canadian Regional Climate Model version 5, CRCM5-LE). Interestingly, these patterns align well with clusters derived from an observational dataset (E-OBS) and with records of extreme historic ...