| Volumes and Issues Contents of Issue 2 |
www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci-discuss.net/4/957/2007/
doi:10.5194/hessd-4-957-2007
© Author(s) 2007. This work is licensed
under a Creative Commons License.
Probability distribution of flood flows in Tunisia
1Department of Earth Sciences, Faculty of Science, Sfax, BP 802, 3018, Tunisia
2Faculty of Science of Sfax, Sfax, Tunisia
Abstract. L (Linear) moments are used in identifying regional flood frequency distributions for different zones Tunisia wide. 893 site-years of annual maximum stream flow data from a total of 37 stations with an average record length of 24.14 years are considered. The country is divided into two homogeneous regions (northern and central/southern Tunisia) using a heterogeneity measure, based on the spread of the sample L-moments among the sites in a given region. Then, selection of the corresponding distribution is achieved through goodness-of-fit comparisons in L-moment diagrams and verified using an L-moment based regional test that compares observed to theoretical values of L-skewness and L-kurtosis for various candidate distributions. The distributions used, which represent five of the most frequently used distributions in the analysis of hydrologic extreme variables are: (i) Generalized Extreme Value (GEV), (ii) Pearson Type III (P3), (iii) Generalized Logistic (GLO), (iv) Generalized Normal (GN), and (v) Generalized Pareto (GPA) distributions. Spatial trends, with respect to the best-fit flood frequency distribution, are distinguished: Northern Tunisia was shown to be represented by the GEV distribution while the GLO distribution gives the best fit in central/southern Tunisia.
Discussion Paper (PDF, 504 KB) Interactive Discussion (Closed, 5 Comments) Final Revised Paper (HESS)
Citation: Abida, H. and Ellouze, M.: Probability distribution of flood flows in Tunisia, Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., 4, 957-981, doi:10.5194/hessd-4-957-2007, 2007. Bibtex EndNote Reference Manager XML
