Analysis of the critical components of flash drought using the standardized evaporative stress ratio.

• Rapid intensification is the main flash drought driver east of Rocky Mountains (RM). • West of the RM, rapid intensification often occurs without reaching drought. • SESR showed strong potential in identifying drought, particularly east of the RM. • SESR is able to represent meteorological and agricultural drought. Flash droughts develop rapidly (∼1 month timescale) and produce significant ecological, agricultural, and socioeconomical impacts. Recent advances in our understanding of flash droughts have resulted in methods to identify and quantify flash drought events. However, few studies have been done to isolate the individual rapid intensification and drought components of flash drought, which could further determine their causes, evolution, and predictability. This study utilized the standardized evaporative stress ratio (SESR) to quantify individual components of flash drought from 1979 – 2019, using evapotranspiration (ET) and potential evapotranspiration (PET) data from the North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR) dataset. The temporal change in SESR was utilized to quantify the rapid intensification component of flash drought. The drought component was also determined using SESR and compared to the United States Drought Monitor. The results showed that SESR was able to represent the spatial coverage of drought well for regions east of the Rocky Mountains. Furthermore, the rapid intensification component agreed well with previous flash drought studies, with the overall climatology of rapid intensification events showing similar hotspots to the flash drought climatology east of the Rocky Mountains. The rapid intensification climatology suggested areas west of the Rocky Mountains experience rapid drying more often than east of the Rocky Mountains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]