Flood Information and Notification System (FINS)

Flood Information and Notification System (FINS) History, Current, and Future of the Flood Information and Notification System (FINS) of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina Josh McSwain Charlotte-Mecklenburg Storm Water Services

FINS History: • Why is a flood warning system needed? • Bottom line, flooding is a threat to human life. • Flood warning became one part of the Strategic Floodplain Guidance Document developed in the late 90’s. • David Ford Consulting Engineers was hired to study the different methods of detecting possible floods (Ex. Forecasting, Modeling, Real-time Analysis). • Our best option was Real-time Analysis

Flood System Requirements • Real-time rain and stream data • Gages and instruments to measure data • Method to report the measured data • Maintenance of field equipment and computers • A plan to receive the data, monitor, and issue warnings • Funding • Staffing for a 24hr 7day system • Particular sites to protect (warning sites) =

USGS Partnership • Mecklenburg County has had a working relationship with the USGS for 30+ years and rain and stream gages have been in place for 40+ years. • 1960's 4 1970's 6 1980's 7 1990's 24 2000's 51 • Currently Mecklenburg County pays approximately $260,000 as part of the partnership to manage FINS. Overall operation budget of just under $1 million (split between the city of Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, and the USGS). • USGS maintains all gage equipment (installation and routine maintenance) along with the radio equipment used to transmit and receive the alert and polling data. Also, they capture, post process, and store all of the alert and polling data within our network of gages.

Receive Alert Data • Alert data is transmitted (from the gage) using a protocol called ALERT. • This data is recognized by our radio equipment, decoded, then passed to DIADvisor and Contrail where it is written to a database. • FINSLIVE and DIADvisor then displays the rain and stream.

Monitor Alert Data and send out Warnings Example of Precipitation Rule • Threat recognition rules developed for 12 vulnerable sites in the county. • Each site has 3 levels of threat status: alert, investigate, emergency. • Total of 59 unique precipitation and stage rules (some with as many as 35 threats) also we have 48 system component rules. Precipitation and stage threats are based on water level, rate of rise, rainfall, and mean areal precipitation (MAP).

Gage Network • 51 Streamgages – 2.5 to 92 sq. mi. • 73 Raingages (1 per 7.5 sq. mi.) • 4 Base Stations Receiving Data • Routine (Polling) Data - Fixed Interval (USGS) • ALERT Data – True Real-Time, Event Driven

Aviso FS – HEC HMS

Streamgages • Pressure Transducers / Stilling Wells / Radars • Water Level Checked Every Minute (once threshold is exceeded) Alert transmits every few seconds • Routine (Polling) Data Recorded Every 5 Minutes • ALERT Data Based on Predetermined Water Level Threshold and/or Rate of Change

Benefits of the System • True Real-Time Data as Opposed to Near Real-Time (Flood Warning vs. 911 call) • Two-Way Communication / Data Verification • Redundancy to Cover Catastrophic Failures • Cooperation between Federal, County, and City Governments, and the Private Sector • Timely Response by Emergency Managers

FINS Room

FINS Future Enhancements Webcams

Advancements Will Allow… • On-call staff and emergency service members to access data from anywhere with an internet connection • More than one user to access the data at anytime • User interaction with a GIS mapping application • Provide additional redundancy for system security and reliability

Additional plans for the Future of FINS • Update phase 2 of AvisoFS live Hec-HMS modeling • Explore the Alert2 protocol. Questions?

Flood Information and Notification System (FINS)