Tropical Cyclones Unevenly Shape Drought Propagation

Abstract Land‐falling tropical cyclones (TCs) bring much‐needed precipitation for drought mitigation, which veils the attribution of missed TC landfalls to drought. Here we assess the global impact of TC landfalls on soil moisture droughts over 1980–2020 from offline hydrologic model experimental simulations forced by precipitation with and without TCs. Results demonstrate that the absence of TC precipitation causes severe soil moisture droughts with different precipitation‐soil moisture‐streamflow pathways. Over arid/semi‐arid regions like Oceania, soil moisture from TC precipitation is desiccated within a year, that is, the absence of TCs triggers severe droughts while soil moisture is not completely dried out even without TC precipitation over humid regions like East Asia. This study highlights the diverse impacts of missed TC landfalls on soil moisture droughts.