South India Floods

IWMI maps to aid emergency response

Last month saw Chennai’s wettest November in a century. Home to 4.3 million people, the South Indian city’s rainfall of 490 mm on 1 December was the highest in 100 years. The result has been widespread flooding with many parts of the conurbation under water. Over 250 people are feared dead, with many more made homeless. On Thursday Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi visited the submerged state capital and adjoining areas, and announced an immediate relief fund of Rs. 1000 crore (USD 300 million). Other areas of Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh are also affected by floodwater.

IWMI is a member of the Sentinel Asia Joint Project Team (JPT) and in collaboration with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and in association with Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) consequently has activated its international disaster charter to prepare emergency response maps in support relief and rescue operations. IWMI has already provided flood situation maps for 11^th and 24^th November using the Sentinel-1 satellite data provided by European Space Agency.

IWMI is providing maps to the Chief Secretary, Govt. of Tamil Nadu, National Disaster Response Force and number of international agencies including UNOCHA, ReliefWeb and UNSPIDER.

See the maps here:

Useful links:

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• https://www.disasterscharter.org/web/guest/activations/-/article/other-in-india
• http://reliefweb.int/organization/iwmi

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Read more about IWMI’s flood mapping work here:

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• http://waterdata.iwmi.org/FloodMapping.php

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Read about the CGIAR Research Program on Water Land and Ecosystems here:

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• https://wle.cgiar.org/content/floods-preparing-reacting-and-benefitting

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The maps and data sets are also being used by the insurance company AON Benfield to estimate flood insured losses, and  the Vellore Institute of Technology which is working closely with Government of Tamil Nadu on relief measures including medical camps to help mitigate the spread of water-borne diseases.

For more information please contact Amarnath Giriraj

This work is joint supported by: