RT Journal Article
T1 Historical catastrophic floods at the southern edge of the Atacama Desert: A multi-archive reconstruction of the Copiapó river extreme events
A1 Izquierdo, Tatiana
A1 Rivera, Ai Ling
A1 Galeano, Ángela
A1 Gallardo, Diego
A1 Salas, Verónica
A1 Aparicio, Olga
A1 Buylaert, Jean Pieter
A1 Ruiz Muñoz, Francisco
A1 Abad de los Santos, Manuel
AB The last hydrometeorological extreme event that caused large floods in the southern Atacama Desert in March 2015 raised concern about how little was known about the fluvial dynamic of these arid basins. Understanding the response of intermittent and ephemeral rivers in drylands to the present context of global change is critical to preserve the ecological and human systems they support, to sustainably manage their scarce water resources and to develop flood risk management plans. We have studied the instrumental and historical record and explored the potential of the Copiapó River geological record in the comprehension of how extraordinary the 2015 flood was and how its fluvial dynamic relates with global climate oscillations. We have identified 36 flood events that have occurred in the last 400 years: 22 of them have been classified as ordinary rises of the river flow (discharges <30 m3/s), 11 as extraordinary floods in which the damage is confined to areas adjacent to the river (discharges 30–180 m3/s), and only 3 as catastrophic floods (discharges >180 m3/s), including the 2015 flood event. The incorporation of the historical and palaeohydrological data into the flood frequency analysis results in an increase of the magnitude of the flood quantiles in which large flood events occur with an average recurrence interval of 120 years. Most of the flood events were caused by heavy rains that are largely linked to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation with a superimposed effect of the ENSO. Discharges >30 m3/s, i.e., extraordinary and catastrophic floods, occur with positive phases of the PDO and the ENSO. Further exploration of the fluvial geological record of the Copiapó River will help lengthening to thousands of years the flood record what will help improving communities' resilience by anticipating flood hazards in the current global change context, in which stronger rainfall events modulated by ENSO and ENSO-like conditions are expected.
PB Elsevier
SN 0921-8181
SN 1872-6364 (electrónico)
YR 2024
FD 2024-03
LK https://hdl.handle.net/10272/23815
UL https://hdl.handle.net/10272/23815
LA eng
NO Izquierdo, T., Rivera, A., Galeano, Á., Gallardo, D., Salas, V., Aparicio, O., Buylaert, J.-P., Ruiz, F., & Abad, M. (2024). Historical catastrophic floods at the southern edge of the Atacama Desert: A multi-archive reconstruction of the Copiapó river extreme events. In Global and Planetary Change (Vol. 236, p. 104411). Elsevier BV. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2024.104411
NO The authors acknowledge ANID (Agencia Nacional de Investigación) for its financial support through grant FONDECYT (Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Científico y Tecnológico) 11160405 (COPIFLOOD project) and Universidad Rey Juan Carlos for its financial support through the IMPULSO project VARHIDRO (M2994). The authors also thank MabelTapia for her assistance at the Municipal Archive of Copiapó, Guillermo Cortés and Rodrigo Zalaquett for their support at the Atacama Regional Museum Archive, and Eduardo Fritis for his help in the transcription of the historical documents. In addition, we thank the anonymous reviewers and the editor, Ian Fuller, for their careful reading of our manuscript and their many insightful comments and suggestions.
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Huelva
RD 1 jun 2026