title: The application of the European heat wave of 2003 to Korean cities to analyze impacts on heat-related mortality.
abstract: The goal of this research is to transpose the unprecedented 2003 European excessive heat event to six Korean cities and to develop meteorological analogs for each. Since this heat episode is not a model but an actual event, we can use a plausible analog to assess the risk of increasing heat on these cities instead of an analog that is dependent on general circulation (GCM) modeling or the development of arbitrary scenarios. Initially, the 2003 summer meteorological conditions from Paris are characterized statistically and these characteristics are transferred to the Korean cites. Next, the new meteorological dataset for each Korean city is converted into a daily air mass calendar. We can then determine the frequency and character of "offensive" air masses in the Korean cities that are historically associated with elevated heat-related mortality. One unexpected result is the comparative severity of the very hot summer of 1994 in Korea, which actually eclipsed the 2003 analog. The persistence of the offensive air masses is considerably greater for the summer of 1994, as were dew point temperatures for a majority of the Korean cities. For all the Korean cities but one, the summer of 1994 is associated with more heat-related deaths than the analog summer, in some cases yielding a sixfold increase over deaths in an average summer. The Korean cities appear less sensitive to heat-related mortality problems during very hot summers than do large eastern and Midwestern US cities, possibly due to a lesser summer climate variation and efficient social services available during extreme heat episodes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Geography and Environmental Sustainability, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA. jgreene@ou.edu.
authors.forename: J Scott
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Greene
authors.affiliation: Department of Public Health Sciences, Miller School of Medicine, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, USA.
authors.forename: Laurence S
authors.initials: LS
authors.lastname: Kalkstein
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Meteorological Research, Korea Meteorological Administration, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Kyu Rang
authors.initials: KR
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Meteorological Research, Korea Meteorological Administration, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Young-Jean
authors.initials: YJ
authors.lastname: Choi
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Meteorological Research, Korea Meteorological Administration, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Dae-Geun
authors.initials: DG
authors.lastname: Lee
mesh_terms: D002947:Cities / Q000453:epidemiology; D005602:France; D006358:Hot Temperature / Q000009:adverse effects*; D006801:Humans; D009026:Mortality; D056910:Republic of Korea / Q000453:epidemiology; D012621:Seasons; D014481:United States
keywords: Extreme heat events; Heat-related mortality; Korea; Synoptic climatology