CURRENT AFFAIRS

Detailed explanation-1: -In a bid to aid in the mitigation activities of the flood prone city, Disaster Management Department, of MCGM, Govt. of Maharashtra approached the MoES to develop iFLOWS- Mumbai, as similar system was already developed by MoES and put into operation in Chennai.

Detailed explanation-2: -What is ‘IFLOWS-Mumbai’? IFLOWS is a joint initiative between the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) and Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC). It is a monitoring and flood warning system. It will be able to relay alerts of possible flood-prone areas anywhere between 6 to 72 hours in advance.

Detailed explanation-3: -Notes: The Assam State Disaster Management Agency and UNICEF have jointly developed an online flood reporting and information management system in Assam. The new system would replace the existing mechanism which is manually operated and is time consuming one.

Detailed explanation-4: -Central Water Commission (CWC) provides statistical methodology (gauge to gauge correlation) based short range flood forecast. Presently, flood forecasts are issued by CWC at 332 stations (133 Inflow Forecast Stations and 199 Level Forecast Stations). Annually, about 10, 000 flood forecasts are issued by CWC.