You may have heard of the severe flooding taking place in the UK within the last few weeks, fortunately only as part of a simulation conducted by the Environment Agency for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Welsh Assembly. Known as
"˜Exercise Watermark’, the exercise was conducted to test the arrangements and response to severe,
wide-area flooding across England and Wales.
The simulation formed the perfect opportunity for a DMCii led team of space experts to observe and participate in the practical aspects of a disaster to see how data and services from space could be used to improve UK emergency response.
During a disaster, such as severe flooding, space-based services can provide disaster response teams with up-to-date satellite maps and asset tracking capabilities to improve their situational awareness. Damaged or overloaded communications infrastructure on the ground can be reinforced using satellite telecommunications. "˜Exercise Watermark’ provided the team with a unique first-hand view of how a disaster is handled on the ground. Adina Gillespie, DMCii Project Manager pointed out:
"We know the contingency community doesn’t need to understand whizzy gadgetry, so now we’re asking ourselves how can we incorporate information from space assets seamlessly into their existing disaster response procedures".