Development of a Beta Version of a Flood Early Warning System for Meuse River Tributaries

Extreme pluvial floods, such as the devastating 2021 summer floods that occurred in multiple Meuse tributaries in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany, pose significant challenges for water managers and authorities due to the limited time available to respond effectively. In steep and rapidly responsive catchments, the lag times between extreme rainfall events and the resulting peak discharges and water levels are often very short.

The "A Beta Version of a Flash Flood Early Warning System for Meuse River Tributaries" work package, as part of the Interreg EMR project, aims to capitalize on recent advancements in short-term rainfall forecasting and hydrological/hydraulic modeling. The primary goal is to develop a beta version of an operational Flash Flood Early Warning System for several Meuse tributaries. By incorporating state-of-the-art approaches in meteorological and hydrological prediction, this system is anticipated to significantly extend the lead time for anticipation, providing authorities with crucial additional hours to implement necessary precautionary measures during extreme flood events.

This research builds upon the work of Ruben Imhoff, who focused on blending radar rainfall nowcasting data with numerical weather model predictions and utilizing them as inputs for the wflow_sbm hydrological model. The work of Athanasios Tsiokanos on validating the improvements made to the FEWS system. The works of Angela Klein and Sebastian Hartgring on improving the parameterization of the wflow_sbm hydrological model for the Geul and Rur catchments.