Chesapeake Coastal Flooding Forecasts
Harnessing Crowd-Sourcing and IoT Technology to Create Real-time Flood Alerts
In a lab tucked into the back of the Nguyen Engineering Building on at GMU, a group of undergraduates, graduate students, and PhD candidates from a wide range of disciplines—engineering, geography, and computer science—tackle a joint effort and shared passion: Flood Hazards Research.
Welcome to SurgeNOW: Enabling real-time weather coastal flooding forecasts in the Chesapeake Bay.
Welcome to the Mason Flood Hazards Research Lab and Team Ferreira.
This 4–VA funded project team, led by Associate Professor of Water Resources Engineering Dr. Celso Ferreira, is working in collaboration to create a pioneering system to predict floods and create flood threat alerts in real-time throughout the Chesapeake Bay region.
Water Power: A Personal, Professional, and Property Takeaway
Brazilian-native Ferreira initially became interested in the flow of water as a surfer growing up near the Atlantic Coast. However, his focus on water flow grew by several chance turns in his career path—the first when he arrived at Texas A & M University as Hurricane Ike slammed through Galveston in 2008; and again in 2012 when Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast shortly after he began his career at GMU. Those fateful encounters offered Ferreira a front row seat to the powerful effects of nature’s greatest resource.
To read the rest of this article, go to Harnessing Crowd-Sourcing and IoT Technology to Create Real-time Flood Alerts.
Dr. Celso Ferreira
Associate Professor of Water Resources Engineering
Dr. Jen Irish
Associate Professor of Civil & Environmental Engineering
In addition to loss of life, flooding can have devastating economic consequences. Superstorm Sandy caused an estimated $50 billion in damage, and more recently, Hurricane Matthew resulted in extensive flooding throughout Virginia. Understanding more about flood waters is critically important for the commonwealth.
