Moisture Sources and Pathways of Annual Maximum Precipitation in the Lancang‐Mekong River Basin

Abstract

Abstract Recent extremely heavy precipitation has led to substantial economic losses and affected millions of residences in the Lancang‐Mekong River Basin (LMRB). This study analyzed the spatial‐temporal characteristics of the annual maximum precipitation (R1X) of the LMRB and identified the moisture sources and pathways conducive to R1Xs using a Lagrangian back trajectory model. Results show that India Ocean and Bay of Bengal (IO/BOB), local evapotranspiration, and West Pacific Ocean and East China (WP/EC) are the three main moisture transport pathways of the R1Xs in LMRB, contributing 68.3%, 20.4% and 11.3% of the trajectories, respectively. R1Xs in the downstream eastern area are affected by tropical cyclones bringing large amounts of moisture from the WP/EC. As tropical cyclones shifted northward under climate change impact, more extreme precipitation occurred over the LMRB due to moisture coming from WP/EC, but those from the IO/BOB had decreased because of the slowdown of flows across the Equator.

Keywords

• extreme precipitation
• moisture transport
• climate change
• Lancang‐Mekong river basin
• tropical cyclone