Exploring the Signature of the Apollo Medicane in the Central Mediterranean Sea Through Multi-source Data Analysis: Satellites, Radar HF, Marine Buoys, and Seismic Data in October 2021

Abstract

In the last decades, the frequency of extreme weather and marine events has drastically increased. During the last week of October 2021 an intense Mediterranean hurricane (Medicane), named Apollo, affected many countries on the Mediterranean coasts. Eight people died as a consequence of the floodings from the cyclone in the countries of Tunisia, Algeria, Malta, and Italy. A preliminary search for possible signatures of the Apollo Medicane by meteorological satellite, radar HF, marine buoy, and seismic data is performed. This was done in a framework of an international collaboration between Italian and Maltese partners for the monitoring of the sea state in scenarios of climate change. The experimental results confirm, at this preliminary stage, the possibility and the usefulness of jointly looking at such phenomena with multiple aims of retrieving a more robust characterization, having a backup alternative in case a primary monitoring network gets failure, and pathing the way to heuristic and data-driven analytical and predictive approaches to Medicanes issues.