VinAWARE System Offers Decision Support in Vietnam

Storms and reoccurring floods cause major damage in Vietnam. For decision makers, dealing with these hazards is particularly challenging because it requires integration and analysis of a great deal of data in a very short span of time. This issue is made more complex in Vietnam where these data come from multiple regional, national, and sub-national sources, and is often not in electronic format. Automating and consolidating the data, and presenting the results on a single map greatly enhances disaster managers’ ability to quickly access and understand the information, and rapidly decide on a proper course of action.

To strengthen Vietnam’s capacity for flood monitoring and warning, PDC developed a web-based early warning decision support system for use by disaster managers in the most vulnerable provinces. The system, called VinAWARE, is a customized version of PDC’s DisasterAWARE^®. It integrates map data, impact models, rain- and stream-gauge measurements, and meteorological forecasts to promote near real-time situational awareness and provide warnings based on criteria established by the government of Vietnam. The interface is in Vietnamese, along with most of the information resources and data products. The project, funded by USTDA, included a training program for national and provincial level disaster professionals that incorporated scenario-based exercises.

VinAWARE provides Vietnam’s Disaster Management Center (DMC) with state-of-the-art decision making capabilities that shorten the time between receiving bulletins and taking action.

Cover photo: Talbot Brooks