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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">EGUsphere</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>EGUsphere</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub"></issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus Publications</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/egusphere-2026-5459</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>WCD Ideas: The transition from event-based storylines to conditional climate trajectories</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>León-FonFay</surname>
<given-names>Dalena</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0009-0003-0507-2273</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Shepherd</surname>
<given-names>Theodore G.</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff4">
<sup>4</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>van Garderen</surname>
<given-names>Linda</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff5">
<sup>5</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Feser</surname>
<given-names>Frauke</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>Institute of Coastal Systems, Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon, Geesthacht, Germany</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>Hamburg University, Hamburg, Germany</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>Department of Meteorology, University of Reading, Reading, United Kingdom</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff4">
<label>4</label>
<addr-line>Jülich Supercomputing Centre, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff5">
<label>5</label>
<addr-line>Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research Utrecht, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>23</day>
<month>09</month>
<year>2026</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2026</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>11</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2026 Dalena León-FonFay et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2026</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-5459/">This article is available from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-5459/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-5459/egusphere-2026-5459.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2026/egusphere-2026-5459/egusphere-2026-5459.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>The recent emergence of studies using multi-year storyline simulations raises questions regarding the interpretation of the climate information they provide. We argue that these simulations can be viewed as conditional climate trajectories, extending the original event-based storyline concept while preserving its fundamental philosophy of conditioning on atmospheric circulation. The transition of storylines from assessing individual events to continuous multi-year simulations changes how the associated statistics and attribution statements should be interpreted and communicated. Therefore, in this paper, we revisit the conceptual interpretation of multi-year storyline simulations and examine the implications of viewing them as conditional climate trajectories.&lt;span&gt;&lt;/span&gt;</p>
</abstract>
<counts><page-count count="11"/></counts>
</article-meta>
</front>
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