Developing of a Methodology and Modeling Application for Forecasting of Potential Losses from Iskar River Floods for the Region of Novi Iskar, Bulgaria

In the autumn of 2007 ReSAC participated in a pilot project for developing of a methodology and modeling application for forecasting of potential losses from Iskar river floods for the region of Novi Iskar, Bulgaria.

The main contractor of the project was Agency for Sustainable Development and Eurointegration – ASDE with subcontractors Remote Sensing Application Center – ReSAC and National Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology – NIMH.

The main beneficiary of the project is Sofia Municipality and the project was fulfilled with the coordination of the State Agency for Information Technologies and Communications – SAITC.

The project had the following tasks:

• Developing of a methodology for flood simulation and analyses of potential losses, prediction of flooded area along Iskar river in the Novi Iskar region;
• Integration of GIS information with satellite images;
• Developing of a methodology for metadata for satellite images;
• Testing of different DEMs for flood modeling.

The project followed the main principles from the new European directive for floods issued on 23th October 2007. The aim of the EU Flood Directive is to reduce and manage the risks that floods pose to human health, the environment, infrastructure and property. According to the EU Flood Directive, Member States will have to reduce flood risk for those areas where the risk is deemed significant. This is done by first determining the extent of flood risk (through flood hazard mapping and flood risk mapping). Consequently, objectives for flood risk reduction have to be established, as well as the measures that will be taken to reach these objectives. These are laid down in flood risk management plans.

The project shows also some of the GMES services for provision of information products for floods based on earth observation technologies.

The project was focused on two big floods which occur in June and August 2005.