Composite tracks of Mediterranean cyclones (1979-2020)

The composite tracks of Mediterranean cyclones have been produced by combining an ensembles of 10 independent track datasets, applied to ERA5 reanalysis for the period 1979-2020. Composite tracks describe more intense and longer-lasting cyclones with more distinguished early, mature and decay stages than cyclones coming from individual tracking methods.

Composite tracks are ranked according to their confidence level, i.e. the number of individual cyclone tracking methods that tracked the same cyclone. For each confidence level, we provide a separate file that includes a matrix of eight columns and a number of rows that varies among the datasets. Each row corresponds to a single track point, while the eight columns provide the following information:

- Column 1: A cumulatively increasing index that functions as an identifier of unique cyclone tracks. For instance, all information about the track of cyclone #456 are found in all rows starting with the number 456.

- Column 2: Longitude of track points

- Column 3: Latitude of track points. It is important to note that geographical coordinates are

produced using Step 2 of our method and thus may not match the exact location of grid points of ERA5.

- Column 4: Year of occurrence

- Column 5: Month of occurrence

- Column 6: Day of occurrence

- Column 7: Hour of occurrence

- Column 8: Lowest MSLP value (in hPa) within a 2.5 degrees radius from the geographical coordinates in columns 2 and 3. These values are only meant to function as an approximate reference of intensity.