PO 2005 FLOOD EMERGENCY
Description of the project
Title:
Po 2005 - Flood Emergency
Programme:
Community Mechanism to Facilitate Reinforced Co-operation in Civil Protection Assistance Interventions - GUCE/GUUE C 92/39 of 16/04/2004
Grant agreement n°:
07.030601/393315/2004/SUB/A5
Applicant:
Emilia-Romagna Region - Civil Protection Service
Main Partners:
i.Comune di Ferrara - Civil Protection, Geology and Energy Division
ii.Vigilanza Antincendi Boschivi section of Ferrara - Civil Protection - Dip. Naz. Prot. Civ. N.80914, Registro Regionale Volontario N. 030961
iii.Ferrara Provincial Administration - Civil Protection Technical Department
General objectives:
The main objective to be reached is to prepare an European web of civil protection volunteers involved in a high level risk of flooding and to improve their technical formation by practice and theory in order to accelerate the response in case of emergency. We will propose the regional task model as a basis of a similar plan at European level. Our purpose is verifying materials and equipments, human resources and international co-operation during assistance interventions. In order to establish a common understanding of the intervention system, the project would foresee many formative courses before, during and after the exercise, with the aim to satisfy the demand of many volunteers that are interested in collaborating with international voluntary forces and that would like to increase their preparation.
An European Network will be settled. First of all it will join main partners and participants, but its ambition is to join, under the same coordination, all European organizations operating in the field of civil protection. The network tasks will be:
i.Information
ii.Planning of European projects
iii.Funds raising
iv.Project managing and realization
v.Advisory service
vi.Studies, analysis and publication of the results
vii.Coordination of common actions
viii.Editing and publishing of a common glossary
European dimension:
The project is open to 8 foreign organizations of volunteers in civil protection and it will develop an integrated system of intervention in case of emergency. 18 volunteers for each country will be involved on its realisation. National groups will be composed by 2 team leader (or group leader), that will receive a different kind of training, based on command, and that will participate at every meeting. 16 ordinary volunteers will complete the team. Their direct involvement will have the purpose to realize the exercise in all its practical aspects. The participants organizations, together to the main partners, will be the first core of the new network.
Place of execution and scenario of the main event:
The scenario will be the catchments area in the province of Ferrara.
The full scale exercise will belong to the mixed typology and will last for 7 days. Two days of command post exercise will take place in the same week. Referenced historical events: Unfavorable meteorological conditions in the Piemonte and Lombardia's areas, bring to an elevation of Po pole; the maximum supposed flows are referring to the combined level of the flood occurred in 1951, in November 1994 and in October 2000. Event's scenario: The situation is deteriorate by the presence of sirocco winds on the coast that obstaculate the outflow to the sea of the Po waters. The hydrometric level keep on growing and the ground begins to have hydro-saturation: precise outflows take place along the foot bank of the Po and specially in the area of Ferrara municipality, along the first stretch of Goro's Po in line with the inhabitants of Serravalle, Massenzatica and Mesola. Areas where the ground begins to have hydro-saturation are located mainly in a strip that runs in a parallel way with the foot of the main bank where the imbibitions line results uncovered; we state in the list below the main critical references, delined by areas of hydro-saturation, outflows and parts of banks subjects to erosion and sometimes to landslide.1.Ferrara Municipality - Pontelagoscuro village 2. Ro Municipality - built-up area of Guarda and its west bank until Gorgo Antonelli village. 3. Mesola Municipality-Massenzatica village.
The elevated hydrometrical level of Po river, joined with the sirocco winds on the coast, brings on the overflow of the river in line with the built up area of Pontelagoscuro, and exactly in the length among the bowl of Boicelli Canal and the roadbed of Ferrara - Padova railways. This rupture would be the most dangerous for the city of Ferrara, even according to the minimum distance of the river from the city. With such a flow, 9400 m³/s, the maximum water height oh the site of rupture is evaluated in m 11,50. The first overflowed built up area would be Pontelagoscuro that shows minimum heights of the ground lower than 4m; waters could reach high level up to more than 4 m. The city of Ferrara (the historical centre) would be flooded, with the water level even higher than 1,5 m. The most probable sequence for the flood would be as it follows: Pontelagoscuro, S. Giovanni, the historical centre, Diamantina, Mizzana. However, the calculations that have been carried out until nowadays, exclude the getting over of "Ducale" Bank, whereas localized overflows would keep possible from Volano and Primaro banks.
(from P.S.C. of Ferrara Municipality edited by Prof. Marco Bondesan)
Results expected:
i.Verifying the activation system, included the availability, of the Coordination Center elements
ii.Verifying the communications between Operative Centers
iii.Verifying the procedure time between different elements and Operative Structures that take part in the exercise
iv.Experimenting the regional informatics system for spreading and transmitting communications at regional and provincial level
v.Verifying the realization steps of the basic camp and of the operative interventions
vi.Verifying the integration between the regional civil protection structure and the European voluntary force structure
vii.Verifying available materials and equipments.
Quality control mechanism:
An Orienting and Monitoring Committee shall be formed by 1 delegate of the Civil Defense Service, the project leader appointed by the training authority, the classroom tutor appointed by the training authority, the volunteers delegate appointed by the Civil defense service.
The Committee's monitoring activity suggest to investigate on:
i.Effectiveness (the success of the implemented action, or the capacity to produce during the action the foreseen results).
ii.Consonance (comparison between the project reference strategies and organizational and methodological choices adopted to improve the action).
iii.Adequacy (the project management ability to act towards tackling and solving problems).
iv.Efficiency (the action suitability to optimize and maximize the available resources in terms of productivity in the use of available resources)
v.Consistency (project relevance and quality of the organizational layout, with reference to balance among actions and achievements of the identified goals).
Evaluation methodology:
Global planning and realisation phase:
i.Setting of two preliminary meetings in which partners and participants should be able to evaluate the progress of the project
ii.Opening of some thematic forums on the official website
iii.Presence of 3 foreign observers at least of the whole project, involved in every phase of it
iv.Continuous and permanent promotion of all actions
v.Opening sources to all relevant documents to guarantee the maximum of transparency
vi.Preview of a final evaluation meeting
Main event phase
i.Little evaluations: for example, every day after the breakfast, the volunteers and the specialists can meet and decide how to manage the interventions procedures, how to overview the teams actions, and suggesting a peculiar subject for the next theoretical lesson.
ii.On going evaluations: volunteers are asked to match their interventions or their timed resolutions, in order to identify the best procedure, working in groups of different nationalities.
iii.Big evaluations: the first big evaluation will be the equipment check in, followed by the first international meeting on camp with all groups and all specialists, reading together the detailed program and discuss the procedures about the emergency.