An alternative flood measurement approach: Flood Meter

Abstract

Flash floods commonly occur in urban areas due to a short period of heavy rainfall associated with the large impervious area and inadequate drainage system. An increase in the uncertainty of predicting flash floods, especially due to climate change, reduces the accuracy of the existing flood forecasting system. In such cases, the affected zone’s actual flood level data is required for more effective flood management and incident response. This study aims to develop a mobile application called Flood Meter to identify flood levels in real-time. It measured the flood level based on object scale and images taken by mobile phones. Although the validation using an actual flood event with three different types of mobile phones shows lack of accuracy but by considered the maximum flood level only 0.17 m and the result keep improving when flood level increase, it shows a potentially good agreement compared with manual measurement. The application can become an alternative method to disseminate accurate real-time flood situations as well as flood data collection for future flood risk management.