THE City of Mandurah will be part of a three-year research and development project to develop a national Early Warning System to alert coastal communities of impending storm wave damage, potentially saving lives and the prevention of billions of dollars in property damage.
“The aim of this research is to develop the core scientific and technical knowledge for an open coast hazard Early Warning System specific to Australian geological and coastal conditions while drawing on the immense experience of our overseas partners in America and Europe,” key project partner Northern Beaches Mayor Michael Regan .
Consisting of two fully-integrated components, the proposed Early Warning System will comprise a system for accurately forecasting potential regional-scale storm-wave damage and beachfront dunes over-topping and the ability to predict local-scale coastal erosion events referred to by coastal engineers as ‘storm demand’ at known erosion hotspots.
They will be provided in the form of high resolution, rolling three-to-seven-day real-time forecasts.
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At the Northern Beaches (NSW) and WA test locations, the project will evaluate a combination of different wave and water-level forecasting techniques, extending from coarser- resolution but longer-range (up to seven days) global forecasting systems through to shorter-range (up to three days) regional systems, providing detailed near shore wave models.
Mr Regan said the aim of the project was to deliver continuous and detailed measurements of dune, beach and surf-zones in real-time at multiple Early Warning System sites.