Abstract. One of the most important hydro-climatic hazards is that of hydric deficits, i.e. drought or flood. Droughts can occur in any region on the Globe but the strongest effects are in arid, semi-arid and sub-humid areas where ecosystems are characterised by high fragility. Drought can also occur in areas where annual or periodical precipitations are “normal” or close to multi-annual means, but the water comes from rare precipitations (mm/min) with high intensities that do not allow accumulation of water in the soil. This type of drought is increasingly frequent in southern and eastern Romania and it tends to extend to central and western Romania. World Meteorological Organisation proposed to define drought as an atmospheric sequence characterised by amounts of precipitations 60% lower than those considered normal. The goal of this paper is to study drought hazard in the conditions of Oravita, Romania, during 2-11-2013. The three years were analysed through the prism of several indicators of drought characterisation in literature and compared to multi-annual mean values. We analysed the following hydro-climatic hazard monitoring parameters in the area of Oravita: the sum of monthly and annual precipitations, the monthly and annual mean of evapotranspiration, the monthly and annual hydric deficits and their graphic representation, monthly and annual mean temperatures and their evolution; we also calculated and analysed climate indicators of characterisation (Thornthwaite, Lang, characterisation depending on deficit of precipitations, etc.). From the point of view of the rainfall regime, an important indicator in defining drought and excess of humidity, the sum of monthly precipitations during summer or spring and their annual amount help draw a conclusion regarding the existence of hydro-climatic hazards during the studied period. Depending on the deficit of precipitations, compared to monthly, seasonal and annual multi-annual means, June, August and September are excessively droughty or droughty in all analysed years. The year 2013 was a very droughty year if we take into account the vegetation period; overall, 2013 was a little droughty year. Results show that there were droughty periods in the three years in Oravita, particularly during the hot season (April-September); 2013 proved the droughtiest year and it is labelled as semi-arid depending on all analysed indicators.

Keywords: average monthly temperatures, sum of monthly precipitations, potential evapotranspiration, aridity coefficient, climate coefficient

Presentation: poster