Villamayor J. auteur aut IRD Mohino E. auteur aut IRD Khodri Myriam auteur aut IRD Mignot Juliette auteur aut IRD Janicot Serge auteur aut IRD text journalArticle eng text/pdf born digital access Precipitation regime shifts in the Sahel region have dramatic humanitarian and economic consequences such as the severe droughts during the 1970s and 1980s. Though Sahel precipitation changes during the late twentieth century have been extensively studied, little is known about the decadal variability prior to the twentieth century. Some evidence suggests that during the second half of the nineteenth century, the Sahel was as rainy as or even more rainy than during the 1950s and 1960s. Here, we reproduce such an anomalous Sahel humid period in the late nineteenth century by means of climate simulations. We show that this increase of rainfall was associated with an anomalous supply of humidity and higher-than-normal deep convection in the mid- and high troposphere. We present evidence suggesting that sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in the Atlantic basin played the dominant role in driving decadal Sahel rainfall variability during this early period. specialized Precipitation Sea surface temperature Atmosphere-ocean interaction Climate models Decadal variability Multidecadal variability SAHEL 032 31 20 8225-8240 2018 0894-8755 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/hor/fdi:010073998 10.1175/jcli-d-18-0148.1 0894-8755 [F B010073998] https://www.documentation.ird.fr/hor/fdi:010073998 https://www.documentation.ird.fr/intranet/publi/2018/09/010073998.pdf Accès réservé (Intranet de l'IRD) IRD - Base Horizon / Pleins textes 2018-10-03 2023-07-11 fdi:010073998 fre