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Medium Range Flood Forecasting Example EFAS

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Handbook of Hydrometeorological Ensemble Forecasting

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Abstract

Europe repeatedly observes flood events that affect several countries at the same time and which require the coordination of assistance at the European level. The European Flood Awareness System (EFAS) has been developed specifically to respond to the need for forecasting transnational floods with sufficient lead time to allow coordination of aid at the European level in case the national capacities for emergency management are exceeded. In order to achieve robust and reliable flood forecasting at the continental scale with lead times up to 10 days, EFAS promotes probabilistic forecasting techniques based on multiple numerical weather prediction inputs including ensemble prediction systems. Its aim is to complement existing national flood forecasting services with added value information and to provide European decision makers with coherent overviews on ongoing and upcoming floods in Europe for better planning and coordination of aid. To date, EFAS is a unique system providing daily, probabilistic flood forecast information for the entire of Europe on a single platform. Being a complementary system to national ones, EFAS predicts the probabilities for exceeding critical flood thresholds rather than quantitative information on stream flows. By maintaining a dedicated, multinational partner network of EFAS users, novel research could be transferred directly to the operational flood forecasting centers in Europe. EFAS development started in 2003, and the system has become fully operational under the umbrella of Emergency Management Service of the European Copernicus Space Program in 2011.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Joint Research Centre (JRC), European Commission, Ispra, Italy

    Jutta Thielen-del Pozo & Peter Salamon

  2. Water Program (WAT), International Institute for Applied System Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria

    Peter Burek

  3. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast, ECMWF, Reading, UK

    Florian Pappenberger

  4. Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute, Norrkoeping, Sweden

    C. Alionte Eklund

  5. Rijkswaterstaat, Water Management Centre for the Netherlands, Lelystad, Netherlands

    E. Sprokkereef

  6. Slovak Hydro-Meteorological Institute, Bratislava, Slovakia

    M. Hazlinger

  7. REDIAM, Sevilla, Spain

    M. Padilla Garcia

  8. ELIMCO SISTEMAS S.L., Sevilla, Spain

    R. Garcia-Sanchez

Authors
  1. Jutta Thielen-del Pozo
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  2. Peter Salamon
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  3. Peter Burek
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  4. Florian Pappenberger
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  5. C. Alionte Eklund
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  6. E. Sprokkereef
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  7. M. Hazlinger
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  8. M. Padilla Garcia
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  9. R. Garcia-Sanchez
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jutta Thielen-del Pozo .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China

    Qingyun Duan

  2. European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, Reading, United Kingdom

    Florian Pappenberger

  3. European Commission DG Joint Research Ce, Ispra, Italy

    Jutta Thielen

  4. National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, Colorado, USA

    Andy Wood

  5. University of Reading, Reading, Berkshire, United Kingdom

    Hannah L. Cloke

  6. Consulting Hydrologist, Annapolis, USA

    John C. Schaake

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Thielen-del Pozo, J. et al. (2015). Medium Range Flood Forecasting Example EFAS. In: Duan, Q., Pappenberger, F., Thielen, J., Wood, A., Cloke, H., Schaake, J. (eds) Handbook of Hydrometeorological Ensemble Forecasting. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-40457-3_51-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-40457-3_51-1

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-40457-3

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