Water Resources Modelling

  The 16th International Conference on Hydroinformatics ( HIC2026 ) held in Zaragoza, Spain, gathered more than 350 participants representing 34 different countries. Organized by IAHR and hosted by Pilar García-Navarro and her computational hydraulics and hemodynamics group GHC ,  represented a 30 years milestone in my career as Hydroinformatics practitioner.  More insights to come soon

This is the toll of a wet year with over 1500 mm rainfall, across the wet Pampa. A selected image at El Gato stream nearby 25 de Mayo to see how it looked like last October. During 2026 IHLLA  monitoring and assessment will continue.    

 On October the 2nd, this is how the surrounding plains of Las Mulitas lagoon at 25th of May village , looked like.     

This is the dike that retains up to 65 Hm3 in such a flat land and keeps safe Azul city when Azul stream raises its levels.         

Principles of Surface Hydrology , with the invaluable drive of professor Erik Zimmermann, recently retired from UNR, and IHLLA colleagues Drs Blanco, Briceño, Holzman, and Ing. Golin. In Spanish, dates 21st-25th April, 2025, promoted by DCAAS-UNCPBA and CADES.    Image: HAND algorithm over FABDEM at Bahía Blanca.

  On March the 7th, the southern cold front brougth the stream close to full discharge capacity, in addition we can observe standing waves in phase with the river bed. But in Bahía Blanca was much worse, to be commented in the next Blog post.

What  a tough year for Argentina, but let me emphasize a few issues for optimism: We´ve been awarded three projects from CFI, FITBA and CIC Buenos Aires public institutions, the first one to design upstream water retention schemes, the second one to include AI on the Azul EWS and the third one to propose drainage and retention soft structures at a plain parcel in direct coordination with the owners, all are measures to gain flood resilience.  Lorena La Macchia MSc thesis dissertation was awarded as the best contribution related to Cartography, Geodesy and Geographic Information in 2024, by the Panamerican Institute for Geography and History . She also received a grant from " Move la America " brasilian program to stay at INPE. The published paper related to Digital Elevation Models in large plains by Ailé Golin et al .                                             ...

Two factors: extreme precipitations (convective cells) and the incapability of the ground/drainage systems to  handle such heavy rainfalls in a short period of time. It´s not the first time, neither the last,  and is still hardly to predict both the focus location and the flash flood evolution. Learning to Live with Risk for each municipality continues as the most reasonable policy, considering that long term climate projections are worse. My condolences for almost one hundred casualties at the moment. Satellite image from RTVE live and ALSOSpace over Valencia. EU-Copernicus Emergency Service Link    for mapping damage extents.

Financed by the Japanese JICA & JST institutions, within the SATREPS (Science and Technology Research Partnership for Sustainable Development ) between Argentina and Japan, a one week congress was held in Buenos Aires UBA campus, with the assistance of many experts and topics from Telemetry, Meteorology, Hydrology, Data Management and Social impact, all related to flash floods prevention in Argentina. PREVENIR started in 2022 and runs till 2027. I had the pleasure to present "Prospects for Azul basin Early Warning System" coauthored by IHLLA colleagues Georgina Cazenave and Ignacio Masson,  and Alex Minett from JBA consulting, UK. Link to the 3 pages abstract .

It is not that easy, even talking about current climate threats, but from last May experience , it´s important to: count on a multi-disciplinary team of collaborators, engage youth with future needs and realistic tools,  and avoid Friday´s afternoon lectures ! A list with a few conclusions is at this link . Image of the drainage network upstream Cacharí, more details and availability at this Zenodo link .

No doubt that a free public university equalises society and prospects for the youth. United to keep on going in Azul, April 23, national marches across Argentina.  

As part of a project led by Dr. Kesserwani , a recent workshop joined an international bunch of experts to share their advances in Sheffield, UK. The pretty much appreciated contributions at this link.   Non related image from the author, showing recirculation patterns by drone footage. 

The IHLLA youngest sharing their hydro-knowledge with high school students, at Barrancosa lagoon , Chillar. The campaign was organized by Romina Achaga, winner of Neville Shulman award by Earth-Watch-Europe , delighted to be part of it.  More info and pics at IHLLA social networks.

To be confirmed after Easter, a 30 hours on-line course with title Flood Risk evaluation with remote sensing and modelling tools , in Spanish, for UNCA students, and other guests. The dates are to be confirmed soon, but the subjects are updated in this LINK . 

A tale of two rains , in so many cities. The 1st heavy rainfall surprises the city with floods but these are non persistent because the drainage system copes with the aftermath.  More importantly the upstream basin is filled, and the following days water raises along the main river channel blocking outfalls and drain pipes (pictured). If a second heavy rainfall happens while the drain conduits are clogged, the impact can be overwhelming.

In February I evaluated the dissertation by Bruno Ortiz from Paraguay, as part of the MSc on Energy and Environment by ITBA (Buenos Aires Technological Institute, Argentina) and KIT (Karlsruhe Technological Institute, Germany),  applied to SG (Salto Grande, Argentina-Uruguay) Hydro-Power exploitation, with title "Prototype design to estimate discharge, by means of LSPIV " (dissertation in spanish). A concise work, state of the art about the setup and configuration of a video camera for LSPIV processing, which aids to estimate surface water speeds, ie flow and discharge. Many thanks to all the involved people: ITBA committee Roberto Vieytes and Cecilia Smoglie, SG Hydrology department Guillermo Collazos and Gonzalo Saprizia, and of course all the congrats to Bruno Ortiz, who´s got the degree successfully.           Picture by ivillanueva: streamlines downstream Faustino Domingo Sarmiento Park gates, Azul, Buenos Aires.

For the present 2024 year, under tough financial perspectives, but with many solutions to develop, our research and action are expected to focus on:   Natural Flood Management measures. Data-Driven modelling. Picture taken at  La Firmeza .

 The two presentation files are to be displayed here soon. The whole set of proceedings is available at this MECOM23 site .    

The argentinian national water congress ,  August 28-30, was very dynamic with a lot of young researches. As part of IHLLA , two posters related to flood modelling and discharge time series forecasting with neural networks were presented. The links to the extended abstracts in spanish and bibliography  are here: Flood Modelling with a diffusion wave approximation over FABDEM between Parish and Cacharí. Discharge forecasting with a LSTM neural network applied to Azul basin DB.  

The XIXth International Congress of History of Science was held, what a gift for a recent graduate to see live two nobel prices in Physics: Nikolái G. Básov and Aleksandr M. Prójorov, from the recently dissolute Soviet Union at that moment. After 30 years what can be told nowadays about scientific development and humanity, a brief chronicle is on the way ...