Online Program Home
My Program

Abstract Details

Activity Number: 661 - The Climate Extremes Program at SAMSI
Type: Topic Contributed
Date/Time: Thursday, August 2, 2018 : 10:30 AM to 12:20 PM
Sponsor: Section on Statistics and the Environment
Abstract #329805
Title: Characterizing Precipitation Extremes in the US Gulf Coast Through the Use of a Multivariate Spatial Hierarchical Model
Author(s): Brook Russell* and Mark Risser and Kenneth Kunkel and Richard Smith
Companies: Clemson University and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and North Carolina State University and Statistical Applied Mathematical Sciences Institute
Keywords: extreme value analysis; spatial interpolation; block maxima
Abstract:

Over a seven day period in August 2017 Hurricane Harvey brought extreme rainfall to the Houston area, resulting loss of human life and catastrophic damage to personal property and public infrastructure. In the wake of this event, there is growing interest in understanding the degree to which this event was unusual and estimating the probability of experiencing a similar event in other locations.

We assume that the annual maximum precipitation values at Gulf Coast locations approximately follow the Generalized Extreme Value (GEV) distribution and model these GEV parameters via a multivariate spatial hierarchical model; for inference, a two-stage approach is used. Interpolation is used to estimate GEV parameters at unobserved locations, allowing us to characterize precipitation extremes throughout the region. Nearby locations may see extreme precipitation from the same event, causing dependence between annual maxima. Similar models have not captured dependence of this type; our model estimates its effect via the nonparametric bootstrap. We also investigate the degree to which sea surface temperature in the Gulf of Mexico is associated with extreme precipitation in the region.


Authors who are presenting talks have a * after their name.

Back to the full JSM 2018 program