Keeping an eye on river height alarms

Horizons Regional Council has for many years now been issuing river height alarms to subscribers through an automated telephone system. Recent developments in mapping capability have now enabled staff to monitor when and where the alarms are being dialed out.

The system is intended as an in-house viewer with low level alarms show up as a blue diamond, alarms that the Operations Duty Officer receives are orange triangles and alarms that the Emergency Management Duty Officer receives are red stars. At a glance, we can see where the areas of concern are.

In addition to this basic information, links within the 'fly-out' take you to the public hydrograph (visible to the public via the Horizons website) and a list of alarm level subscribers showing when they were called, whether they acknowledged the alarm or not and their name and telephone number (only available to staff).

This is the sort of technology that helps duty officers keep an eye on what's going on. I'll certainly be keeping this window open over the weekend.