Changes in precipitation conditions in Slovakia during northern and southern cyclonic situations in the 1991–2020 period

In Slovakia, the spatial distribution of precipitation is inhomogeneous, which is mainly caused by the prevailing airflow of individual synoptic types in combination with a diverse georelief. The article examines the precipitation conditions of Slovakia for all northern and southern types of cyclonic situations in the period 1991–2020. In the selected area we worked with precipitation totals from 798 stations provided by the Slovak Hydrometeorological Institute. We processed the separate dataset in Microsoft Excel and created distinct layers of precipitation totals for all the situations studied in ArcGIS software using a Python script. From the separate datasets, we created precipitation fields for the average annual precipitation total and fields for the percentage of the average annual precipitation fallen during all northern and all southern types of cyclonic situations out of the total average annual precipitation fallen during the whole period under study and for each decade, respectively. Based on the results obtained, we can observe changes in the frequency of occurrence and in the spatial distribution of precipitation, especially for southern, but also for northern cyclonic types of situations. These findings can be used in practice in several fields, especially in synoptic meteorology, climatology, and hydrology.