HISTORY OF FLOODS ON THE TERRITORY OF SLOVAKIA.

The significant increase of precipitation in Slovakia after the long dry period 1981-1994 has a direct relation to the incidence of floods after 1996. Over the past 10 years (2000-2010), the amount of precipitation in Slovakia was by almost 150 mm higher than in 1981-1990. The year 2010 was the wettest one during the last century. The aim of this paper is to briefly summarize the historical floods that occurred in Slovakia. The systematic instrumented hydrological observations were initiated mostly in the second half of the 20th century. The available relatively short time series of water stages or discharge can provide an insight into neither extreme floods with long return periods, nor the significant changes in their frequency and changes in the intra-annual distribution of runoff. Such information may be of importance for risk assessment of both - floods and droughts. Therefore, it is necessary to reach for other data sources as well. The evaluation of the design values (N-year flood) from the series of annual discharge maxima from the instrumented era resulted in an underestimation of the flood risk. Data on floods before the instrumented era can be obtained by analyzing related natural data - so called paleofloods, or various documents and historical sources (flood signs, annals of the cities and villages) - so called historical floods. From our analysis confirms that the flood of 1813 was one of the most significant floods on the territory of Slovakia over the past 250 years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]