Investigation of Extreme Rainfall Events over Zaria and its Environs, Kaduna State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study investigates extreme rainfall events over Zaria and its environs. The major objective was to identify mends in the extreme event over historical records. A 50-year (1966-2015) monthly gridded rainfall data were acquired from the high-resolution 0.50 x 0.50 gridded rainfall data downloaded from the Global Gridded Climatology CRU TS4.00 of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in the (http://badc.nerc.ac.uk). The data analysis adopted standardized precipitation index (SPI) developed by McKee, el al (1993) to classify the extreme rainfall events. The results revealed that the months of May and October within the study periods have witness moderate drought (—1.00 to —1.49). The year of 1972, 1983, 2003, 2007 and 2009, was found to have shown sign of severe drought (-1.50 to -1.99) in the month of October. Rainfall was found to have been received most consistently over the month of June to September in each rear of 1966 to 7015. Generally, the months of July and August in each year were found to have 'alternate extremely wet (2.00 and above), severely wet (1.50-1.99) and moderately wet (1.001.49). The study recommends that planting of agricultural crops should be done within the neat -normal rainfall periods of June to September if the scenario of rainfall events continues.