Historical Catalog of Winter Weather Regimes Impacting California, 1949-2017

This collection contains a historical catalog of daily atmospheric weather patterns observed over the North Pacific Ocean and western North America spanning 1949-2017 as described in the manuscript “Winter wet–dry weather patterns driving atmospheric rivers and Santa Ana winds provide evidence for increasing wildfire hazard in California” (Guirguis et al. 2022). The catalog classifies observed 500 mb geopotential height anomaly patterns according to sixteen recurring winter weather regimes that have been linked to atmospheric river landfalls, extreme precipitation, Santa Ana winds, floods, and wildfires in California. The source data are from NCEP/NCAR global Reanalysis (Kalnay et al. 1996). The weather regimes are defined based on daily positive/negative phase interactions between four key atmospheric teleconnection patterns over the North Pacific (“North Pacific Modes” or “NP4 modes”, Guirguis et al. 2020a and Guirguis et al. 2020b).