European Flood Awareness System EFAS Bulletin April – May 2016 Issue 2016(3) The European Flood Awareness System (EFAS) produces European overviews of ongoing and forecasted floods up to 15 days in advance and contributes to better protection of the European citizens, the environment, prop- erties and cultural heritage. It has been developed at the European Commission’s in house science service, the Joint Research Centre (JRC), in close collaboration with national hydrological and meteorological services and policy DG's of the European Commission. EFAS has been transferred to operations under the European Commission's COPERNICUS Emergency Manage- ment Service led by DG ENTR in direct support to the EU’s Emergency Response Coordination Centre (ERCC) of DG ECHO and the hydrological services in the Member States. ECMWF has been awarded the contract for the EFAS Computational centre. It is responsible for providing daily operational EFAS forecasts and 24/7 support to the technical system. A consortium of Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute (SMHI), Rijkswaterstaat (RWS) and Slovak Hy- dro-Meteorological Institute (SHMU) has been awarded the contract for the EFAS Dissemination centre. They are responsible for analysing EFAS output and disseminating information to the partners and the ERCC. A Spanish consortium (REDIAM and ELIMCO) has been awarded the contract for the EFAS Hydrological data col- lection centre. They are responsible for collecting discharge and water level data across Europe. A German consortium (KISTERS and DWD) has been awarded the contract for the EFAS Meteorological data col- lection centre. They are responsible for collecting the meteorological data needed to run EFAS over Europe. Finally, the JRC is responsible for the overall project management related to EFAS and further development of the system. Contact details: European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Shinfield Park Reading, RG2 9AX UK Tel: +44-118-9499-303 Fax: +44-118-9869-450 Email: [email protected] http://www.efas.eu http://www.ecmwf.int Cover image: River Neckar in Heidelberg on 30th May 2016. Photo courtesy of Paul Meehan and Niklas Conen. 1 EUROPEAN FLOOD AWARENESS SYSTEM: Bimonthly Bulletin – Issue 2016(3) NEWS developments in general, the new seasonal forecasting product total probabilities and calibration. See also the News report from the PICO session on natural hazards below. The EFAS team has now implemented a seasonal out- New partners look for Europe which soon will be available on the EFAS test site. It is using the ECMWF seasonal fore- We welcome Instituto Português do Mar e da At- casts and will be updated once every month. In the mosfera (IPMA) from Portugal as new EFAS partner. first version the forecast up to 8 weeks are displayed. A more detailed description on the forecasts can be Do the EFAS quiz! found below in the bulletin. by Robert Cowling, UK Flood forecasting centre ECMWF recently published a Technical Memoranda In the FFC, we always keep an eye out for novel ap- about the operational implementation of EFAS. For proaches to learning and consolidation of training those interested it can be downloaded here. material. This is a short quiz that was put together to support our Hydrometeorologists in their understand- Meetings ing of EFAS. Test your own knowledge of EFAS: Chinese visiting Rijkswaterstaat In the framework of the cooperation between Rijks- https://www.qzzr.com/c/quiz/203016/efas waterstaat and the Chinese Ministry of Water Resources a workshop was organized on 9 May 2016 RESULTS at the premises of Deltares in Delft. During this work- shop an EFAS presentation was given by Eric Meteorological situation for April - May 2016 Sprokkereef. The Chinese delegation was highly inter- April was wetter than normal for most part of Europe, ested, especially in the foreseen developments except for the central and eastern Mediterranean towards a more global system and compared EFAS countries (Figure 11 and Figure 12). The heavy precipi- with the Chinese flood forecasting system that is in tation led to large number of flash floods for Spain, use at the Institute for Flood and Drought Relieve in France and south-eastern Europe. The temperature Beijing. A more extensive presentation on EFAS might was colder than normal for Western Europe and be given during a symposium that is scheduled in Bei- warmer than normal for south-east Europe and the jing in September 2016 on the occasion of the visit of north-east corner (Figure 15 and Figure 16). the Dutch Minister for Infrastructure and Environ- ment to China. The wet weather in Western Europe continued in May (Figure 13 and Figure 14), with the culmination in late May which led to floods in many countries and fatali- ties in both Germany and France (see separate article about the Paris floods below). The temperatures were normal or colder than normal for most parts of Europe except for the north-east (Figure 17 and Figure 18). Summary of EFAS flood and flash flood notifications for April - May 2016 The 11 EFAS formal and informal flood notifications sent in April - May 2016 are summarized in Table 1 and Figure 1. Chinese Ministry of Water Resources visits Deltares. their locations are shown in Figure 19 and Figure 20. EFAS presentations at EGU 137 Flash Flood watches were sent to the correspond- EFAS and GloFAS was as usual well represented at the ing EFAS partners. The locations are shown in Figure 21 EGU general assembly with talks and posters on EFAS and Figure 22 and Table 2. 2 EUROPEAN FLOOD AWARENESS SYSTEM: Bimonthly Bulletin – Issue 2016(3) FEATURES On 31 May, Météo-France issued a red level alert for Case study: Paris floods May to June 2016 flooding in Loiret. By early Wednesday 1 June, the situ- ation had worsened and Météo-France also issued a by Richard Davies and Fredrik Wetterhall red alert for floods in the department of Seine-et- Marne. By early 2 June, orange alerts were in place for A period of persistent heavy rain in France from 28 May 8 departments in central and north eastern France. 2016 left the departments of Seine-et-Marne and Loi- ret suffering major flooding, with river levels at a 100 Riverine flooding year high by 1 June. Two days later, levels of the River Rivers south of Paris reached record levels during the Seine in Paris reached their highest in over 30 years. first days of June. The level a tributary of the Seine, the Loing River, stood at 4.63 metres at Nemours, about Rainfall 80km south of central Paris, late on 1 June, exceeding Météo-France said that May 2016 was the wettest the previous record high of 4.25 metres set in 1910. At since 1960 in the Île-de-France region. At Paris-Mon- Episy, the Loing reached 3.99 metres on 1 June, beating tsouris station, the monthly total reached 179 mm, or the previous high of 3.68 metres set in 1982. Two days about 3 months of rainfall, beating the previous record later the flood wave reached central Paris. The River of 133 mm in May 1992. Orléans recorded 181 mm of Seine at Paris-Austerlitz reached 6.1 metres on Friday rain in May, beating the previous high of 148 mm in 3 June, its highest level since the floods of 1982. May 1985. During a 24 hour period between 30 and 31 May, 66 mm fell in Trappes, 65.2 mm in Villacoublay, Flood Fatalities and flood disaster response (both in Yvelines department) and 63.4 mm in Orléans, Prime Minister Manuel Valls said four people had died all roughly the equivalent of a month's worth of rain. and 42 were injured across the country. The evacua- tion of priceless artworks from the Louvre and Museum D'Orsay in Paris made headline news across the globe. But it was the work of thousands of person- nel from the emergency and civil security services in the worst hit areas of Seine-et-Marne and Loiret that prevented this flood event from becoming a major dis- aster. Emergency teams carried out as many as 16,000 oper- ations involving the rescue or evacuation of 20,000 people, according to France's Ministry of Interior. In fact the flood response had been well rehearsed just three months earlier, where Parisian disaster manage- Figure 2 Description: Swollen Seine River in Paris, June 2016. ment authorities tested the city’s preparedness and Photo credit: Jean-Claude Utard. response to flooding from the River Seine during an 11 day “Operation Sequana” exercise in March 2016. Flood Warnings The EFAS forecast system indicated as early as 25 May Insurance Costs of €1.4 billion a possible flooding in early June. The forecasts from the The Association Française de l’assurance (AFA) say that th 26 of May also indicated a flood and a flood notifica- 77,000 insurance claims had already resulted from the tion for a 1-in-20 year event was issued for the Loing floods by 07 June. The French insurance industry ex- River (a tributary to Seine) with the earliest predicted pect this figure to rise to around 150,000 claims. The peak on 1 June (in later forecasted the peak flow was AFA said that, as of 07 June, the total amount of the corrected to 3 June). On the 28 May the warning was insured losses was estimated at between €900 million extended to the Seine in Paris. During the coming days, and €1.4 billion. several flash flood notifications were also issued over France. 3 EUROPEAN FLOOD AWARENESS SYSTEM: Bimonthly Bulletin – Issue 2016(3) EFAS Annual meeting 2016 Space Agency (ESA) and JRC.