Investigation of climatic factors affecting occurrence of drought (Case study: Zabol Region)

In order to evaluate the impacts of climatic factors during the periods of the occurrence of wet and dry years, using a model is one of the best solutions. In this paper, drought severity was determined by using Scalogram model based on 3 climatic factors (annual precipitation, number of rainy days and amount of potential evapotranspiration) for Zabol region over 16-years period (1991-2006). The results showed that the most severe drought had not always occured in a year with the least precipitation. This is due to the role of other climatic factors. It is concluded that the occurrence of the most severe drought and the wettest year has been in 2001 and 1992, respectively. In addition, potential evapotranspiration is the most important factor affecting on occurrence of drought in the study area.