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• Proactive drought responses are crucial in a drought vulnerable future. • Antecedent conditions need to be considered in context of anticipated conditions. • We combine rainfall, soil moisture and evapotranspiration data with forecasts for early warning. • Validation efforts found promising accuracy in the drought early warning maps. • Proof-of-concept drought early warning system can aid proactive drought management. Droughts are a cyclical feature of Australia's climate that have compounding impacts on agricultural productivity and the wellbeing of drought-affected communities. Understanding anticipated drought conditions in context of antecedent observations is critical to providing early warning of drought. In this study we paired probabilistic seasonal rainfall forecasts with precipitation, soil moisture and evapotranspiration data that were objectively combined using Principal Component Analysis (PCA). The final Drought Early Warning System (DEWS) maps overlay forecasting information with the multi-variate PCA-weighted maps at 1-, 3- and 6-month timescales over the common period of overlap between all datasets (1982–2018). In this study period, the 1982–1983 Ash Wednesday tinder drought and the 1997–2001 Millennium drought were investigated. We validated PCA-weighted maps with satellite vegetation data and found performance was strongest over the Murray Darling Basin region (R = 0.63, p = 0.009) and poorest over Central interior Australia (insignificant correlations). We also validated PCA-weighted maps using agricultural commodity data from ABARES. Significant negative correlations at 95 %, 99 % and 99.9 % confidence intervals were found between %-Area in drought category and crop cultivation area; export volume/value; crop yield; and rural debt. Our findings indicate that early warning of drought can be categorised by concern – wherein dry antecedent conditions and dry forecasted conditions are of the highest concern. The developed proof-of-concept DEWS contributes to the growing body of proactive drought management research. In a drought vulnerable future, operationalising and communicating drought early warnings will be critical to reducing the harmful impacts of drought on communities, economies, and environments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Changes in both soil moisture and extreme rainfall influence historical flood trends. • The influence of soil moisture and extreme rainfall depends on flood severity. • The more extreme a flood event is, the less dependent it is on soil moisture changes. • Changes in soil moisture need to be considered in projections of flooding. Despite the expectation that increases in rainfall with climatic change will result in increases in pluvial flooding, there is more historical evidence for decreases in flood magnitude. In Australia, as in many other parts of the world, flood magnitudes are mostly decreasing, despite increasing rainfall extremes. Here, we show how changes in soil moisture have led to decreasing flood magnitudes while rainfall extremes have been increasing. Using gauged streamflow, catchment average rainfall, and modelled soil moisture data across Australia we confirm that streamflow peaks (or floods) that occur at least once a year are strongly related to both the peak rainfall causing the flood and the antecedent soil moisture conditions preceding the storm event. Regions where the magnitude of the peak flow has decreased are visually and statistically correlated to regions of decreasing soil moisture. Flood magnitudes are more likely to increase only for the rarest events, with increases in rainfall offset by decreases in soil moisture for more frequent events. A recurrence interval dependent tipping point is identified beyond which trends in catchment rainfall outweigh those of soil moisture trends and dominate the flood response. For regions where soil moisture has decreased, this tipping point occurs at an average recurrence interval of ten years or more. As most studies investigating trends in flooding generally use annual maxima, changes in soil moisture are likely to be the dominant mechanism behind observed flood trends. Hence changes in soil moisture conditions need to be considered when predicting catchment flood response due to climatic change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Australian Landscape Water Balance model is used to evaluate hydrologic trends. • Trends in modelled streamflow are evaluated against observed streamflow. • Rainfall, soil moisture, and streamflow trends are consistent with tropical expansion. • Changes in flood and drought are linked to mean rainfall changes at continental scale. • Trends are more likely to be driven by local factors at the catchment scale. Changes in the hydrologic cycle have far reaching impacts on agricultural productivity, water resources availability, riverine ecosystems, and our ability to manage environmental assets, bushfire risk, and flood hazard. For example, declining rainfall in the southeast of Australia has led to a prolonged period of drought, with serious impacts on agriculture, the environment, and water supply to urban and rural towns. Here, using the continental wide Australian Water Resources Assessment Landscape model (AWRA-L), we evaluate historical trends from 1960 to 2017 in rainfall, soil moisture, evapotranspiration, and runoff to explain changing drought and flooding. Northern parts of Australia have experienced increasing annual rainfall totals, resulting in increased water availability in the tropics with increased soil moisture, evapotranspiration, and runoff, particularly during the hot, wet monsoon season. In contrast, the southwest and southeast coast of Australia have experienced declines in rainfall, particularly in the colder months, corresponding with decreasing evapotranspiration, soil moisture, and runoff. Trends in flooding are aligned with runoff trends, and closely follow trends in rainfall, with changes in soil moisture of secondary influence. Streamflow droughts, measured by the standardised runoff index, are increasing across large parts of Australia, with these increases more widespread than changes in rainfall alone. Increases in rainfall in the tropics of northern Australia appear to be related to decreasing drought occurrence and extent, but this trend is not universal, suggesting changes in rainfall alone are not an indicator of changing drought conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]