FLoods and fIre Risk assessment and managEment
Funding EU programme: LIFE+ Programme
Period: October 2012 – September 2015 (36 months)
Partners: Leader, National Technical University of Athens, Laboratory of Hydrology and Water Resources Management, Centre of Hydrology and Informatics (NTUA), Greece;
Imperial College London (ICL), UK; IRPI-CNR, Research Institute for Geo-Hydrological Protection, National Research Council, Italy; National Observatory of Athens (NOA) – Institute of Environmental Research; ALGOSYSTEMS S.A.(ALGO), Greece; Foundation for Research and Technology-Hellas, Institute of applied and computational Mathematics (FORTH), Greece.
Description: FLIRE is a demonstration project aiming to the development of an integrated Decision Support System (DSS) for both flash floods and forest fires risk assessment and management . FLIRE’s area of implementation is the peri-urban environment of the Eastern Attica region, more specifically the Rafina river basin (Greece), a typical Mediterranean area extends over about 130 km2 with rapid and uncontrolled urbanization. This pilot area is quite prone both to flash floods and forest fires resulting in its gradual ecological degradation, with significant consequences for the almost 5 million inhabitants of Athens. The DSS tool will be designed by using state of art tools, technologies and methods and taking into account prevention, adaptation and interaction issues. The final model will be online available to key stakeholders and relevant authorities (local and national) for the combined, effective and efficient floods and fires risk management. The main objectives of the DSS development are:
- minimize of the impact of floods and forest fires on human lives, ecosystems and properties;
- improve Floods’ prevention level;
- improve the Flash flood mitigation;
- improve the Forest fires’ prevention level and forests’ protection;
- raise awareness on both hazards of flash floods & forest fires and their combined effects in both environmental and socio-economic aspects of Eastern Attica and Athens city.