10th Workshop on European Storms

5 - 7 February 2025
University of Bern, Switzerland

Conference board

  • Christoph Raible, Physics Insititute and Oeschger Centre (OCCR), U. Bern, Switzerland
  • Martina Messmer, Delft University of Technology, Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft, Netherlands
  • David Stephenson, Exeter Climate Systems (XCS) Research Centre, U. Exeter, UK
  • Len Shaffrey, Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, Reading, UK
  • Giovanni Leoncini, RMS, Switzerland
  • Joaquim Pinto, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research, Karlsruhe, Germany
  • Silke Dierer, AXIS Capital, Zurich, Switzerland
  • Richard Dixon, CATinsght, London, UK
  • Niklaus Merz, Partner Re, Zurich, Switzerland

Announcement

Extratropical storms are a major source of natural hazards with devastating socio-economic impacts. Yet, processes involved in their generation and intensification as well as the generation of associated disastrous impacts such as flooding are not fully understood. Moreover, rising temperatures and the projected future changes urge the need to assess and understand the behaviour of extratropical storms and associated extreme events. Research question like how extratropical storms do or do not intensify und global warming are key not only for scientists but also for stakeholder from the insurance industry.

In 2011, the European storm workshops aims at bringing together dynamical meteorologists, climatologists, statisticians, stakeholders and risk model developers from insurance and engineering consultant companies. Thereby, these interdisciplinary workshops try to bridge state-of-the-art breakthroughs in sciences to the practical implementation in risk modeling.

Scope of the conference

Over the past 25 years, severe storms hit Europe with substantial economic damage. Lothar and Martin (1999), Kyrill (2007), Xynthia (2010) are the unforgotten names of storms that caused extensive and expensive damage. In recent years, Storm Eunice (known as Storm Zeynep in Germany and Storm Nora in Denmark) in the wind storm season 2021-22 and Storm Ciarán (known in Germany as Storm Emir) in November 2023 were devastating and extremely powerful extratropical cyclones. Moreover, the 2022–23 European windstorm season was so far the deadliest and costliest European windstorm season on record. One event in this season, the medicane Daniel, caused up to 20 billion Euros of damage and 18,000–20,000 (estimated) fatalities.

Therefore, the aim of the workshop is to bring together scientists from dynamical meteorology and climatology as well as stakeholders from the insurance and engineering industries so that they can share recent research ideas.

The workshop is a continuation of a series of European storm workshops which started in 2011. It is a unique opportunity to combine the strong Swiss research in this field with international research activity and the experience of insurance experts and engineering consultants, both strong pillars of the Swiss economy.

The workshop further facilitates the cooperation between science and industry and will help in the design of end-to-end projects, i.e., from scientific understanding to implementation in practice.

Format and sessions

The conference will cover the following topics:

  • Processes and dynamics of extratropical storms
  • Prediction and predicability of extratropical storms on weather to decadal timescales
  • Past variability and future changes in extratropical storms
  • Impacts of extratropical storms
  • Assessing (EU WS) storm-related insurance risks

Conference Homepage

5th Workshop on European Storms

Photo

group of participants

Programme

WEDNESDAY 5th February
12:00 Registration  
12:45 Welcome C. Raible
 
Session 2 – Prediction and predictability of extratropical storms on weather to decadal timescales (Conveners: S. Dierer, C. Raible)
     
13:15 Evaluating Extratropical Cyclones Track Position and Intensity Biases in Machine Learning Weather Prediction Models (PDF) H. Dacre
13:40 Extreme event attribution for a midlatitude cyclone using weather Forecasts  (PDF) S. Ermis
14:05 Extending the Lead Time of Skilful Seasonal European Winter Windstorm Forecasts using Autumn Initialisations of Ocean Seasonal Predictions G. Leckebusch
 

WEDNESDAY 5th February
Session 5 – Assessing (EU WS) storm-related insurance risks
     
14:30 Enhancing European Wind Risk Models with Observational Data (PDF) L. Villiger
14:55 Evaluation a UK windstorm model against claims: Have we been lucky in the last decade? Y. Q. Wong and
M. Rohrer
15:20 40 min coffee break and Poster session  

WEDNESDAY 5th February
 
Session 5 – Assessing (EU WS) storm-related insurance risks (continued) (Conveners: S. Dierer, N. Merz)
     
16:00 Uncertainty in loss modeling of historical windstorm A. Zhao and
G. Leoncini
16:25 A Physics-Based Deep-Learning Framework for Simulating European Windstorm Risk A. Blanchard
16:50 Cluster of storms and insurance impact L. Hasbini
17:15 Inter-Seasonal Clustering of European Windstorms and its Implications for Reinsurers A. Robson and
C. Allen
17:40 Process understanding of the correlation between the accumulated losses of compound multi-peril events D. Stephenson
18:05-18:55 Discussion of the first day  
19:00 Icebreaker dinner at ExWi building  
 

THURSDAY 6th February
 
Session 3 – Past variability and future changes in extratropical storms (Conveners: J. Pinto)
 
08:40 Forced trends and internal variability in projections of European Storminess M. Priestley
09:05 Detecting trends in extratropical storms using analogues  (PDF) V. Thompson
09:30 Increasingly seasonal jet stream enhances joint wind-flood risk in Great Britain (PDF) J. Hillier
09:55 Evidence of a Recent Decrease in Wintertime Nordic Seas Storminess L. Shaffrey
10:20 Past and future Mediterranean cyclone characteristics using a regional climate model (PDF) O. Doensen
10:45 30 min Coffee break  
11:15 Breakout groups
Potential Topics:		  
  1. What are the new challenges in process understanding of the dynamics? Rapporteur: S. Gray and L. Shaffrey
  2. Is high resolution (km-scale) modelling the solution? Rapporteur: M. Messmer and F. Pantillon
  3. From storms to impacts – what is missing? Rapporteur: J. Pinto
  4. Will AI-techniques lead to vast improvements in modelling EU WS? (PDF) Rapporteur: N. Merz
  5. Leveraging modelling advancements in building European Windstorm (EU WS) risk models Rapporteur: G. Leoncini and M. Rohrer
 
12:30 - 13:30 Lunch  
Poster session
15:00 30 min coffee break  
 
Session 3 – Past variability and future changes in extratropical storms (continued) (Convener: D. Stephenson)
 
15:30 Future Changes of European Windstorm Losses in EURO-CORDEX Simulations (PDF) I. Alifdini
15:55 Exploring the variability of extreme windstorms in the Euro-Atlantic region in future climate projections H. Afargan Gerstman
 
Session 4 – Impacts of extratropical storms
 
16:20 Compound precipitation and wind extremes: an extratropical cyclone-centric perspective J. Catto
16:45 Incorporating Exposure Information into Science: The Risk of Synoptic-Scale Arctic Cyclones to Shipping (PDF) A. Vessey
17:10 A New Database of Extreme European Winter Windstorms J. Pinto
17:35-18:30 Discussion of the second day  
19:000 Dinner at the Rosengarten  
 

FRIDAY 7th February
 
Session 1 – Processes and dynamics of extratropical storms (Conveners: M. Messmer)
 
08:50 The North Atlantic Waveguide, Dry Intrusion, and Downstream Impact Campaign (NAWDIC) (PDF) S. Raveh-Rubin
09:15 A global climatology of sting-jet extratropical cyclones (PDF) S. Gray
09:40 Characteristics of diabatically driven high impact cyclone affecting Europe (PDF) S. Christ
10:05 Temporal clustering of extreme European winter windstorms on intra-seasonal timescales S. Feltz
10:30 Understanding processes leading to surface gusts by modeling windstorms at very high resolution (PDF) F. Pantillon
10:55 30 min Coffee break  
11:30 Reports from Breakout Groups and Concluding Discussion  
13:00 End of the Meeting  

Poster sessions
     
Batibeniz Fulden Hindcast Simulation of Medicanes with the Regional Earth System Model
Binder Hanin Frequency anomalies and characteristics of extratropical cyclones during extremely wet, dry, windy and calm seasons in the extratropics
Doyle Alex Reviewing Europe ETC Climatology Using Counter-Factuals
Federer Marc On the relationship between extratropical cyclones and the energetics of the global atmosphere
Givon Yonatan Understanding the source of extreme Mistral winds and their role in governing ocean evaporation
Mireia Ginesta Climate change fingerprint on the 2023 Emilia Romagna floods
Hauser Seraphine The role of extratropical cyclones for large-scale forecast busts over Europe in ERA5 reforecasts
Hawkins Ed Improving reconstructions of historical windstorms and translating them into a warmer world
Martínez-Alvarado Oscar Windstorms in the past and future over the UK and Europe in a Single-Model Initial-condition Large Ensemble
Messmer Martina Impact of SSTs on central European flooding event in September 2024
Ng Kelvin The UNSEEN Hazard of Severe Extra-tropical Cyclones of Tropical Origin to Europe
Jones Toby Enhancing windstorm return period estimates for (re)insurance
Schnyder Franziska The influence of cold, continental air on cold air outbreaks and downstream extratropical cyclones
Selvakumar Vishnupriya The Impact of Warm Conveyor Belt Outflows on Upper-level Dynamics: Case studies and Climatological Analysis
Steinfeld Daniel Windstorm Risk Model for the Canton of Zurich: Impact Forecasting and Probabilistic Risk Assessment
Tsoi Yee Chun Using Generative Models to Produce Realistic Populations of UK Windstorms (PDF)
Volonté Ambrogio The origins of Storm Ciarán: From diabatic Rossby wave to warm-seclusion sting-jet cyclone