2016-07-18 General Committee Meeting - Item 3 - Attachment 1 - Flood Management Plan

Available flooding information should be fully redundant        The Enviromon system and its traditional interface are not




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in the event of a disruption to access to council’s network     considered to be user friendly and have not been designed




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however it can be dependent on other technology. It is          for infrequent or intuitive use. Hence, a number of local




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recommended that redundancy options and alternate               governments have begun to explore additional software




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operating procedures for each system associated with flood      systems that provide greater accessibility, interpretation
monitoring and for providing flood advice to the LDMG           and warning capabilities of Enviromon collected data.
be developed to reinforce the process of providing flood        Such systems may improve user access and the quality of
advice in the event of a failure to one of these systems.       advice provided during flood events. It is recommended
                                                                that Council consider options to utilise additional
10.1.4    Real-time flood monitoring                            software options to enhance the functionality and improve
                                                                accessibility to Enviromon readings.
To fulfil an advisory role with regards to flooding
during a disaster management activation will require
                                                                10.2 Disaster Management Activations
an understanding of the real-time conditions being
experienced in the waterways and catchments within              A local disaster coordination centre will typically be
the Council area. The standard procedure/system for             activated prior to an impending flood event based upon
obtaining this information is currently via the Bureau of       advice received from the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM).
Meteorology’s Enviromon system which is hosted within           However, during the event it will be expected that local
Council and can be accessed via Council’s internal network      conditions are being monitored by council officers
or by remote login to a stand-alone PC.                         supporting the coordination centre and that forecasts from
                                                                the BoM are also being interpreted with regards to local
Varying levels of user proficiency are required to access
                                                                conditions. This requires a good working knowledge of
and manage the Enviromon system. It is recommended
                                                                available flood map products and the BoM’s Enviromon
that a broad user base be trained in a basic proficiency
                                                                system by a sufficient number of trained officers to be able
which would enable them to independently login to
                                                                to cover a rotating shift over at least 24 hours.
Enviromon and view relevant rainfall or water level
readings for gauges within the Council area. A smaller          10.2.1    Trained staff resources
subset of this user group should also be trained in more
advanced management of the Enviromon system. It is              Interpreting real-time flood information requires a basic
also recommended that a single point of contact (with a         understanding of hydrology (rainfall runoff) and hydraulics
hierarchy of alternative contacts) should also be established   (water conveyance) and the ability to translate observed
to ensure coordinated management of the Enviromon               or forecasted information into expected outcomes based
system and communications with Bureau of Meteorology            upon the know characteristics of local catchments and
(BoM).                                                          waterways. Varying levels of understanding of hydrologic
                                                                concepts such as rainfall intensity and duration, runoff
A basic working knowledge of Enviromon amongst                  times of concentration and rainfall volume would be
sufficient staff from across the organisation is required       expected. Similarly varying levels of understanding of
to be able to cover a rotating shift over at least 24 hours.    hydraulic concepts such as rate of rise, backwater effects,
This assumes an eight hour shift with a one hour handover       flood waves and tailwater conditions would be expected.
between shifts. To cover these shifts without duplication
therefore requires a total of four trained staff.




                                                                                    Noosa Council | Flood Management Plan | Page 35