Driven by climate change, sudden swings between wet and dry create “hydrologic whiplash”

Driven by climate change, sudden swings between wet and dry create “hydrologic whiplash” References 1 M. J. DeFlorio et al., From California’s extreme drought to major flooding: Evaluating and synthesizing experimental seasonal and subseasonal forecasts of landfalling atmospheric rivers and extreme precipitation during winter 2022/23. Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc. 105, E84–E104 (2024). 2 California Nevada River Forecast Center, Heavy precipitation events California and Nevada Section 1: Late December 2022 and January 2023. https://www.cnrfc.noaa.gov/storm_summaries/dec2022Jan2023storms.php#:~:text=The%20impacts%20of%20the%20floods,Dollar%20Weather%20and%20Climate%20Disasters. Accessed 7 April 2026. 3 O. Zimmerman et al., PhenoCam Dataset v3.0: Vegetation Phenology from Digital Camera Imagery, 2000–2023 (Version 3). ORNL Distributed Active Archive Center (2025). https://doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2389. Accessed 29 April 2026. 4 D. L. Swain et al., Hydroclimate volatility on a warming Earth. Nat. Rev. Earth Environ. 6, 35–50 (2025). 5 W. Li, S. Maharjan, H. El-Askary, Atmospheric teleconnection patterns and hydrological whiplashes in the Western US. Sci. Rep. 15, 21262 (2025). 6 W. Li, S. Maharjan, J. B. Fisher, T. Piechota, H. El-Askary, Escalating hydrological extremes and whiplashes in the Western U.S.: Challenges for water management and frontline communities. Earth’s Future 13, e2024EF005447 (2025). 7 C. Madrigal et al., Water whiplash in Mediterranean regions of the world. Water 16, 450 (2024). 8 Y. Yang, G. Villarini, L. Yang, Spatiotemporal dynamics of hydrological whiplash events across the contiguous United States. ESS Open Archive [Preprint] (2025). https://essopenarchive.org/doi/full/10.22541/essoar.176677740.06055648/v1 (accessed 7 April 2026). 9 D. L. Ficklin et al., Hydrological intensification will increase the complexity of water resource management. Earth’s Future 10, e2021EF002487 (2022). 10 T. W. Corringham, F. M. Ralph, A. Gershunov, D. R. Cayan, C. A. Talbot, Atmospheric rivers drive flood damages in the western United States. Sci. Adv. 5, eaax4631 (2019). 11 X. Serra-Maluquer et al., Impacts of recurrent dry and wet years alter long-term tree growth trajectories. J. Ecol. 109, 1561–1574 (2021). 12 The Washington Post, Giant oak trees, some more than a century old, are dying in Maryland and across the mid-Atlantic. Baltimore Sun, 7 December 2021. https://www.baltimoresun.com/2021/12/07/giant-oak-trees-some-more-than-a-century-old-are-dying-in-maryland-and-across-the-mid-atlantic/. Accessed 28 May 2026. 13 J. S. Clark et al., Continental contrasts in climate extremes that control tree fecundity. Glob. Change Biol. 32, e70738 (2026). https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gcb.70738. 14 L. Lowman, J. K. Roundy, “Vegetation whiplash: Understanding global trends in dramatic vegetation shifts” in 2025 American Geophysical Union Conference Program. https://agu.confex.com/agu/agu25/meetingapp.cgi/Paper/1875250. Accessed 20 May 2026. Information & Authors Information Published in Classifications Copyright © 2026. This article is distributed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License 4.0 (CC BY-NC-ND). Submission history Published online: June 10, 2026 Published in issue: June 16, 2026 Authors Metrics & Citations Metrics Altmetrics Citations Cite this article Driven by climate change, sudden swings between wet and dry create “hydrologic whiplash”, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 123 (24) e2617960123, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2617960123 (2026). Copied! Copying failed. Export the article citation data by selecting a format from the list below and clicking Export. View Options View options Download this article as a PDF file. PDFeReader View this article with eReader. eReader