Debris Flow Monitoring System

The Debris Monitoring System was first established in 2002 by GIS.FCU, and has been developed and enhanced since then. The monitoring system provides a single entrance to access all necessary data for debris flow monitoring and disaster response. During the typhoon events, the system assists the decision makers to understand the local conditions at the potentially impacted areas, determine the emergency operations, and order the local government for preparation.

The system manages different types of observation data from sensors at the site. Sensors of rain gauge, soil moisture, The data and other information are transmitted through the Internet or satellite communication depending on the network stability. Among the sensors and instruments, the image from CCD camera is significant to both the government and the public in terms of disaster response and debris flow education. There are almost 70 CCD camera installed at the sites. In order to share the CCD images to people who from different units, agencies, institutes, and even other countries, a common data exchange rule should be followed. Therefore, the Sensor Observation Service (SOS) defined by the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) is adopted in the monitoring system to provide the Web service. The corresponding information about SOS can be found at OGC website (http://www.opengeospatial.org/).

GIS.FCU had developed a code generator which can automatically produce the OGC SOS-compatible XML of a CCD sensor; such that the monitoring system can publish it online for interaction. Anyone who follows the OGC SOS standard can request the CCD image and get the information directly from the Debris Flow Monitoring System.

In the near future, the sensor data sharing for other types (e.g., the rain gauge) will be implemented into the monitoring system using the same OGC SOS standards as a Web service. The eventual goal is to reach the interoperability for the monitoring networks in Taiwan.

Integration Platform for River Monitoring and Management Systems

River management is an important issue for the government. In order to monitor the areas along the major rivers in Taiwan, the local River Management Office (RMO) had been requested to develop its own monitoring system, and the Water Resources Agency (WRA) started in 2011 to develop an integrated information platform to manage among the RMOs. The integrated system of WRA offers one integrate entrance for online browsing and search. Because of the various devices and instruments installed by each RMO, the integration platform needs to use a communication standard such that the data from each RMO can be recognized without specific interpretation. The OGC SOS standards, therefore, had been adopted in the system to provide rules and construct a framework of data sharing between RMO and WRA.

The system mainly operates to catch any unusual events at the site. Images from each CCD can be analyzed automatically and the system uses different rules to identify if any intrusion or suspected activities at the river region. Alerts will be sent by the system to the correspondent personnel and managers when uncommon conditions detected.

The integration process of monitoring systems had indicated the feasibility and workability of a common interface for river management. The integrated system can receive monitoring data from various resources and achieve the goal of basin-wide monitoring network. The platform has not only enhanced the response to the unusual events, but also assisted the disaster response during the typhoon and rainy seasons.