The paper deals with a topic that is current and of great importance to society. It reveals and illustrates the complexity of coupled human-hydrological-ecological systems and identifies starting points for improved management of droughts and associated risks.

The paper presents a methodology for spatial identification of regions exposed to multi-hazards at pan European level, thus offering a significant contribution to the knowledge gap of decision makers and stakeholders which are still lacking a place-specific information of the proneness of their region to multi-hazard events as opposed to single hazard events.

The paper explains the factors which made the Ahr flood event of 2021 the deadliest one in Germany, causing more fatalities than all flood events of the previous 40 years together. It points out that 75% of the fatalities occurred outside of the established flood hazard zones. On the basis of individual fatality reports, factors additionally to early warning and evacuation deficits are identified. A particular result is that beyond danger zones like campsites and cellars the percentage of deaths on the ground floor of buildings (37 %) or outside on the street (18 %) were particularly high. Recommendations for improving emergency management of such unprecedented floods are given.

The manuscript offers significant contributions that justify its consideration as a highlight paper: It presents a novel, multifaceted methodology for identifying and compiling single hazard types and multi-hazard interrelationships in data-scarce urban settings, which is applied in the context of Kathmandu Valley, Nepal. The research provides a comprehensive database of 21 single hazard types and 83 multi-hazard interrelationships, contributing critical insights for disaster risk reduction (DRR) in “Global South” urban areas, with an emphasis on inclusive, people-centred approaches. By integrating stakeholder perspectives and multi-hazard scenario generation, the paper advances the development of dynamic risk scenarios, strengthening multi-hazard approaches for disaster preparedness and response.

The results I find particularly relevant are: 1. While individual crops have specific drought risks, an assessment of the risks across them is a valuable approach. 2. A clear link to meteorological drought in a particular seasonal period can be identified

The paper offers an interesting case study about Switzerland's earthquake risk. It may be of interest for nation-wide studies and public management of earthquake threats.

Forest fires have become a major problem in many regions of the world, including parts of Central Europe. The modelling study addresses the different factors for Forest Fire Susceptibility (FFS), making use of high spatial resolution of input data for the state of Brandenburg, Germany. An increasing susceptibility is found under rising greenhouse gas forcing scenarios when other changes are not taken into account. Extreme weather periods are of particular relevance in this respect. However, the importance of anthropogenic and vegetation parameters for modelling FFS on a regional level can outweigh the pure climatic effects. The paper also suggests some recommendations for forest management and environmental planning for a reduction of fire risk.

Observations suggest a clustering of severe convective storms near orography. The paper provides information on the gaps in our process understanding and the measurement techniques which are currently hampering an improved prediction of the events and their associated hazards. It provides an outline of a multinational coordinated European field campaign on Thunderstorm Intensification from Mountains to Plains.

This paper shows a very useful analysis of social media activities during volcanic eruptions. The authors used social sensing of Twitter posts to track social action and reaction changes throughout the 2018 eruption of Kīlauea, Island of Hawaiʻi.

The Ahr valley flood of 2021 has been one of the most severe flooding events in Germany, with the highest death toll since the coastal storm surge event of 1962, and severe destruction across the valley associated also with extreme financial loss. Deficits in the warning procedures were re-visited after this event, and major improvements like cell broadcast warnings were introduced. The question remains open if the event could have been even more devastating under (almost) the same weather situation. The spatial shift of the rainfall fields the authors conduct is a simple but very reasonable approach as input for estimating counterfactual flooding scenarios with their numerical models. In the paper they demonstrate that the flood could have been much worse in terms of the flood peaks, inundation areas and maximum depths as well as exposed assets, given a shift of the rainfall fields of only about 20 km.

This study introduces a new approach to multi-hazard risk assessment, leveraging hypergraph theory to model interconnected risks posed by cascading natural hazards. Traditional single-hazard risk models fail to account for the complex interrelationships and compounding effects of multiple simultaneous or sequential hazards. Conceptualising and visualising risks within a hypergraph framework overcomes these limitations, enabling efficient simulation of multi-hazard interactions and their impacts on infrastructure. The authors apply their model to the 2015 Mw 7.8 Gorkha earthquake in Nepal as a case study, demonstrating its ability to simulate the primary and secondary effects of the earthquake on buildings and roads across the whole earthquake-affected area. The model predicts the overall pattern of earthquake-induced building damage and landslide impacts, albeit with a tendency towards over-prediction. Their findings underscore the potential of the hypergraph approach for multi-hazard risk assessment, offering advances in rapid computation and scenario exploration for cascading geo-hazards. This approach could provide valuable insights for disaster risk reduction and humanitarian contingency planning, where anticipation of large-scale trends is often more important than prediction of detailed impacts.

This paper demonstrates a significant technological advance, from measurements of snow depth at a point at high temporal resolution, to mapping snow depth at the 100m scale with high temporal resolution. It has important applications in snow hydrology, snow avalanche research, and climate monitoring. The approach and design are described in detail and will be useful for other researchers looking to apply this approach. The paper is clear and well written, with important details included.

This paper presents a method for characterizing regional landslide potential, which the authors suggest as an improved basis for landslide hazard forecasting during storms. It discusses the advantage of using considering the relative soil-saturation rather than a rainfall recurrence interval to understand landsliding triggered by rainfall, focusing on data from California.

While there are many examples on vulnerability mapping for climate-related hazards in the academic literature, there is very limited evidence of those maps being used by practitioners to achieve a systematic and long-term reduction of risk and vulnerability from climate-related hazards. The authors have identified spatial planners as key players in reducing risks from climate-related hazards in urban areas and use existing spatial planning laws as the starting point to define the legal requirements vulnerability maps need to fulfill to be usable by spatial planners. This innovative approach presented for the example of spatial planning in Stuttgart, Germany demonstrates a promising way to overcome the current gap between research and practice on urban climate change adaptation.

The paper provides new and interesting insights on risk assessments for sensitive infrastructure. While risk assessments for critical infrastructure are relatively established the authors highlight the need for similar definitions and procedures for sensitive infrastructure such as special needs education facilities. The paper makes an important contribution by both defining sensitive infrastructure and developing a risk assessment process. A case study for a special needs school affected by the 2021 floods in the Ahr valley, Germany provides interesting insights on how to apply the risk assessment method developed by the authors to inform a 'build back better' approach.