The Flood Hub by Google extends to 80 countries, including Greece, providing forecasts up to 7 days before a flood, to 460 million people
As stated in a related announcement, natural disasters, such as floods, are constantly increasing in frequency and intensity due to climate change, threatening the safety and living conditions of the population. According to estimates, catastrophic floods affect more than 250 million people worldwide each year, causing approximately $10 billion in damages.
As part of its effort to harness Artificial Intelligence to tackle the climate crisis, Google announced today that it is expanding its flood forecasting systems to 80 countries. Thus, with the inclusion of 60 new countries from all over Europe (including areas of Greece), Africa, the Asia Pacific region, and South and Central America, the Flood Hub platform now includes some of the world's regions with the highest exposure to flood risks or other extreme weather events, protecting 460 million people all over the planet.
The Flood Hub can be used by governments, aid agencies and individual users to take early action and prepare for potential floods by having access to 7-day depth data and forecasts. This is a significant improvement over last year where such information was available in depth just 48 hours.
The Flood Hub's Artificial Intelligence system uses a number of different public sources of information, such as weather reports and satellite imagery. It then combines two models: the Hydrologic Model, which predicts how much water will flow in a river, and the Inundation Model, which predicts which areas will be affected and how high the waters will reach.
Using Artificial Intelligence to prepare for flooding
In 2018, it launched the flood forecasting system in India, then expanded it to Bangladesh to help deal with the devastating floods that occur there every year. Thanks to the progress made in global prediction systems through Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, in 2022 Coogle was able to make this technology available in 18 additional countries, paving the way for global expansion. The Flood Hub is part of her program Google Crisis Response to provide valid information and resources in times of crisis – such as floods, fires and earthquakes. For more than a decade, he has been working with emergency response teams to develop technology and programs that help protect, inform and prevent the world from being exposed to risk.
Additionally, in support of communities that are most vulnerable to flooding but may not have access to smart phones or the internet, Google.org is partnering with organizations such as Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, the Indian Red Cross Society and the Yale University Inclusion Economics team, to create offline early warning networks of specially trained, willing and trusted volunteers, which will multiply the reach of Flood Hub messages.
According to recent data from his team Yale and the NGO Yuganter, communities that have local volunteers are 50% more likely to receive alerts before waters reach their area – which could be fatal for many.
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