Abstract
The present study aims at exploring the potential of multi-scalar meteorological drought indices in detecting soil moisture drought events. The standardized soil moisture index(SSMI), standardized precipitation index(SPI), standardized evapo-transpiration index(SEI), standardized precipitation evapo-transpiration index(SPEI) and multi-variate moisture anomaly index(MMAI) were computed using long-term (1980-2015) MERRA-2 soil moisture, precipitation, evapo-transpiration data products, respectively. The performances of the meteorological indices were evaluated based on zone-wise and spatial correlation approach along with failure rate (FR) and false alarm rate (FAR) values. The spatial correlation was highest in SEI, followed by MMAI, in comparison to both SPI and SPEI. FR and FAR values denoted that SEI is the best index for detecting soil moisture drought events. Whereas, MMAI outperformed other indices in representing combined drought events, i.e. meteorological or/and soil moisture droughts. The outcome of the study may be useful in retrieving information about soil moisture drought over a region exclusively using meteorological parameters.
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