26/10/2020

EMSN078 Spain, Tsunami risk analyses

CEMS INFORMATION BULLETIN Nr 135 THE COPERNICUS EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT SERVICE

The Copernicus Emergency Management Service develops tsunami risk analysis of the Andalusian west coast, Spain

The Spanish General Directorate of Civil Protection and Emergencies (CENEM) triggered the Copernicus Emergency Management Service (CEMS) Risk and Recovery Mapping in July 2020 to develop a tsunami risk analysis in the urban environments along 300 km of the Andalusian West Coast, equal to an area of about 6,780 km2. This activation supports civil protection preparedness activities in the area. The recently completed results include information on tsunami hazard, exposure, and vulnerability of the buildings.

Spain lacks a national tsunami warning centre despite evidenced vulnerability to catastrophic events. The contributions of CEMS in this activation will help inform, prepare and safeguard one of Spain’s most at-risk areas.

Product 1 – Identifying vulnerable infrastructure with general cartography In order to identify tsunami vulnerabilities in populates areas, CEMS Mapping began thier activation by producing maps showing important territorial characteristics in the region. Maps clearly showed topographic, population, industry and transportation features. The resulting product was a geometric layer containing all footprints of buildings present in the area of interest. The layer included information on characteristics of the buildings, such as building material, year of construction, shape, and orientation) useful to evaluate the vulnerability of the structures to the modelled tsunami wave (Figure 1).

Fig 1. Complete Cadastral dataset for study and selection of criteria to extract buildings. (Copernicus EMS © 2020 EU)

Product 2 - Tsunami event model After analysing vulnerable infrastructure, CEMS delivered a tsunami hazard assessment based on a worst-case scenario framework. Three seismic meg-sources were selected based on expert advice and the available bibliography. The numerical simulation of these three events enabled the model to select the most suitable seismic source for the simulation. The calculation was implemented using the Tsunami-HySEA model, a numerical code developed by the EDANYA group of the University of Malaga (UMA), who was directly involved in the activation, that represented state-of-the-art tsunami modelling. The regional model can calculate a tsunami wave height time series, tsunami arrival times, run-up of the inundation along the coastline, and a maximum height, maximum speed, and maximum flow in the inundated area.

Fig 2. Maximum wave height simulation. (Copernicus EMS © 2020 EU)

Product 3 - Tsunami vulnerability model With the ability to project tsunami characteristics through a regional model, CEMS then produced a vulnerability model of the buildings. The model is based on a combination of the reference cartography (Product 1), comprising detailed information on characteristics of the buildings (like building material, year of construction, shape, and orientation) (Product 1), and the information

on inundation height, output of the tsunami modelling (Product 3). The Papathoma Tsunami Vulnerability Assessment (PTVA-3) was applied for this model. This combines the structural and water vulnerability of each building to express a relative vulnerability index (RVI) for each building of the area of interest.

Fig 3. Workflow to determine Building Relative Vulnerability Index. (Copernicus EMS © 2020 EU)

Due to the sensitive nature of the results, the products have only been shared with the authorized user. The publishable cartography, along with a summary description of this activation, can be found on our Mapping portal here. ____________________________________________________________________________

BACKGROUND INFORMATION ON THE COPERNICUS EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT SERVICE (EMS)

The Copernicus Emergency Management Service (CEMS)1, one of the six Copernicus services, provides information for emergency response in relation to different types of disasters, including meteorological hazards, geophysical hazards, deliberate and accidental man-made disasters and other humanitarian disasters, as well as prevention, preparedness, response and recovery activities. Beneficiary end users of EMS include entities and organisations at regional, national, European and international level actors in the field of civil protection and humanitarian aid. CEMS consists of two main components, as outlined below:

The CEMS Mapping component provides, upon activation by Authorised Users2, timely and accurate information derived from satellite or airborne image data, during all phases of the disaster management cycle. The information generated can be used as provided (e.g. as digital or printed map outputs), or further combined with other data sources (e.g. as digital feature sets in a geographic information system) to support geospatial analysis and decision-making processes by disaster managers. The following three modules are in place:

Rapid Mapping consists of the provision of geospatial information in support of emergency management activities immediately following a disaster. Different types of maps are produced: the Reference product to ascertain the situation before the event, the First Estimate product and the Delineation product to assess the geographical extent of the event with respectively a rough

or detailed assessment, or the Grading product to evaluate the magnitude and impact of the damage resulting from the event.

Risk & Recovery Mapping consists of the provision of geospatial information in support of disaster management activities that are not related to immediate emergency response but rather to predisaster risk assessment or post-disaster recovery monitoring. This applies to activities dealing with prevention, preparedness, disaster risk reduction and recovery phases.

Validation is tailored to the on-demand verification of a sample of outputs produced by the above two mapping modes, support services, and the early warning services (see below). It includes external quality control, validation of thematic information content and comparison with alternative information sources related to the specific emergency context.

CEMS Early Warning and Monitoring component provides early warning, risk and impact assessment, and monitoring of specific natural hazards. Currently this component addresses floods, forest fires and droughts, as follows:

The European and Global Flood Awareness Systems (EFAS & GloFAS) provide complementary flood forecast information to relevant stakeholders supporting flood risk management at national, regional and global level. Registered Users have access to the full functionality of EFAS & GloFAS.

The European Forest Fire Information System (EFFIS) monitors forest fire activity in NRT, in Europe, Middle East and North Africa, and supports wildfire management at national and regional scales. Globally, the JRC leads development of the Global Wildfire Information System (GWIS).

The European and Global Drought Observatories (EDO & GDO) provide drought-relevant information and early warnings for Europe and globally, publishing short analytical reports in the case of imminent droughts, and connecting drought data providers and users from global to regional levels.

The Copernicus programme

Copernicus, the European Earth Observation and Monitoring Programme, is served by dedicated satellites (the family of Copernicus Sentinels) and a set of Contributing Missions (additional satellites from existing commercial and national agencies). Since the launch of Sentinel-1A in 2014, the European Union set in motion a process to place a constellation of almost 20 more satellites in orbit before 2030. Today, seven fully operational Sentinel satellites (Sentinel-1A and -B, Sentinel-2A and -B, Sentinel-3A and -B and Sentinel-5P) are in orbit to continually provide operational satellite information. This satellite data is complemented by and validated with in situ data.

Six Copernicus Services transform the full, free and open data into value-added information by processing and analysing the data to transform them into services and products such as informative maps, data sets and reports.

These six services are:

1. The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service 2. The Copernicus Marine Environment Monitoring Service

3. The Copernicus Land Monitoring Service 4. The Copernicus Climate Change Service 5. The Copernicus Emergency Management Service 6. The Copernicus Security Service

Copernicus is coordinated and managed by DG GROW in the European Commission. It is implemented in partnership with the EU Member States, the European Space Agency (ESA), the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), EU Agencies and Mercator Ocean. The European Commission Joint Research Centre offers the technical support of the Copernicus Emergency Management Service whilst the Emergency Response Coordination Centre of DG ECHO assists civil protection actors with the handling of the EMS mapping requests on a 24/7 basis. For more information Copernicus website: copernicus.eu Copernicus Emergency Management Service website: emergency.copernicus.eu On Twitter @CopernicusEMS