A look at the August flash floods in Aberdeenshire

Previsico provides real-time property level flood forecasts and warnings with a 48-hour lead time. Uniquely, these are continuously modelled every three hours using Previsico’s world leading flood nowcasting technology for surface water [‘the biggest flood risk of all’1], in partnership with IBM’s Weather Company. Our forecasts include the depth and time at which flood is predicted at a 25-metre resolution. Previsico’s surface water flood outputs provide actionable forecasts which enable people and organisations, including the UK government, to proactively mitigate surface flood impacts.

On 12th of August 2020 persistent hot weather created ideal conditions for intense localised storms across Scotland. In particular, Aberdeenshire in Scotland experienced torrential rain and lightning which led to severe flooding events in the early hours of the morning, causing considerable disruption.

This case study showcases Previsico’s surface water flood forecasting for the event.

To identify sites of flooding from the event we use crowdsourcing as a method to source proxies using social media outlets (Twitter, Facebook etc.) and news stories (BBC, TheGuardian etc.). This allows us to validate our surface water flood forecasts and identify how accurate our forecasting abilities are for a particular event.