Meteorological drought in the Honduran dry corridor and its relationship with the El Niño / Southern Oscillation phenomenon

Abstract

This research aimed to establish a relation between the periods of meteorological drought in the Honduran dry corridor and the El Niño events of the past five decades, to forecast future periods of drought. For this, a review and selection of the monthly rainfall data series of 13 rainfall stations available in the study area was done. Subsequently, the standardized precipitation index (SPI) method was used and the monthly drought events were obtained for 16 years in which it was assumed that the rainfall regime was affected due to an El Niño event, between May 1972 and April 2017. A relation was established between the years where an El Niño event occurred in January and the drought periods that followed in the same year; from this relation it is concluded that there is 68 % likelihood that there will be a drought period in the year, if an El Niño event is forecast for January.