Cyclones are the main weather modulators in the Mediterranean region and constitute a major environmental risk, often producing windstorms and heavy rainfall. Moreover, cyclones play a key role in the regional climate variability by controlling the oceanic circulation and regional water cycle, and by mobilizing and transporting large amounts of dust from North Africa.
Despite the recent achievements of the scientific community to provide deeper insight into the atmospheric processes and impacts associated with Mediterranean cyclones, there are still unaddressed scientific challenges that require a coordinated approach. In addition, the lack of direct interaction between academic researchers and weather/climate prediction scientists working in operational centres inhibits the efficient exploitation of fundamental research results to improve atmospheric models in a tangible way. Therefore, it is undeniable that there are potentially large societal benefits from improving cyclone predictions for weather and climate timescales.
Efficient networking between stakeholders, operational weather forecasters and researchers is timely and essential to address both challenges of research coordination and operational implementation of scientific results into weather and climate services. This Action will coordinate the activities of researchers in meteorology and climatology and scientists from weather/climate services with the main aims to provide a deeper understanding of Mediterranean cyclones and to improve significantly the European capacity to predict their environmental and climate impacts. In this context, the network will identify, and involve in the network, relevant stakeholders with different backgrounds (e.g. civil protection, re-insurance companies) and co-develop cyclone prediction products tailored to their needs.
