Articles (21)
Solutions · 11 min read
Hydromet network design: from pilot to state scale
How to grow a hydromet monitoring network in stages, using WMO guidance for station density, tiering and upkeep, and why the first pilot decides more than the last tender.
Solutions · 9 min read
The National Hydrology Project (NHP) explained
What India's World Bank-supported National Hydrology Project is, which ministry runs it, what it paid for and what it left behind.
Solutions · 7 min read
CSR projects in community disaster resilience
How corporate social responsibility money can fund disaster management in India, and what makes a project last beyond its first monsoon.
Solutions · 8 min read
Funding early warning in India: SDRF, NDMF and SDMF
What the national and state disaster funds are, how the Centre and states share them, and what a district needs to know to pay for a flood warning system from them.
Solutions · 8 min read
RTDAS in Indian states: how real-time data networks work
What a state real-time data acquisition system is made of, how the National Hydrology Project paid for the first wave, and what keeps the networks running afterwards.
Solutions · 9 min read
Who issues flood and weather warnings in India?
NDMA, SDMAs, DDMAs, IMD and CWC each have a different job: some forecast, some coordinate, and some carry the message the last mile to the village.
Solutions · 9 min read
Early Warnings for All and the Sendai Framework in India
What the UN Early Warnings for All initiative and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction ask of a country, and where India's own system already answers.
Solutions · 9 min read
Dam water release alerts: warning people downstream
What a dam water release does to the river below, what Indian law and CWC guidance ask of dam owners, and how a warning chain should work before the gates open.
Solutions · 10 min read
Inclusive early warning systems: language and disability
A warning that only some people can hear, read or understand is not a warning for everyone: how to design alerts around language, literacy and disability.
Solutions · 9 min read
Writing warning messages people act on
What a flood warning message must say, in what order, and the common wording mistakes that make people wait instead of move.
Solutions · 9 min read
Water accounting in irrigation canals
How to follow every cubic metre from the head regulator to the field, what the standard frameworks ask for, and why the measurements decide the answer.
Technology · 9 min read
Float method of discharge measurement: a field guide
How to measure a river's flow with floats, a stopwatch and a surveyed cross-section, when a current meter cannot go in the water.
Solutions · 6 min read
Underpass flooding and drain monitoring: sensors and alerts
What to measure at a flood-prone underpass and in the drains that serve it, which water level sensor copes with a storm drain, and how readings become alerts and better maintenance.
Solutions · 6 min read
Flash flood safety tips: before, during and after
What to do to stay alive when a hill stream rises in minutes: how to prepare, how to act when the water comes, and what to watch for once it has gone.
Solutions · 9 min read
Flood mock drill: how to run one with community sirens
A practical guide for district teams and village committees on planning a flood drill, agreeing what each siren sound means, timing the warning chain and writing a report that leads to change.
Solutions · 8 min read
Pre-monsoon checklist for flood warning systems
A link-by-link readiness check for the district and state teams who own a flood warning chain, from contact lists and danger levels to alert templates and last year's lessons.
Solutions · 12 min read
Total cost of a monitoring network: beyond the price tag
Where the money goes over a station's ten-year life, why networks decline when operation and maintenance is under-funded, and how to budget so that yours does not.
Solutions · 13 min read
Writing a technical specification for a hydromet tender
How to describe what a monitoring station must achieve, under which conditions, and how you will check it, instead of describing one product.
Technology · 13 min read
River cross-section surveys: why and how often to resurvey
The shape of the riverbed decides every discharge figure computed from water level or velocity, and in a monsoon river that shape changes with each big flood.
Solutions · 13 min read
The Dam Safety Act 2021: what it asks of dam owners and districts
A plain-language guide to which dams the Act covers, the four bodies it creates, what every dam owner must do and by when, and why district administrations are part of the picture.
Solutions · 12 min read
Reservoir level monitoring: what dam operators need to measure, and why
The levels that define a reservoir, the elevation–area–capacity curve that turns level into storage, and why a continuous level record changes what an operator can see and do during a flood.