WMO Cataloging Initiative

Geneva, Switzerland

Meeting of the

Inter-Programme Task Team on Cataloguing Extreme

Weather, Water and Climate Events (IPTT-CWWCE)

18-19 February 2018

Overall Cataloging Approach

James Douris

Multi-Hazard Early Warning Services Division

WMO

Challenges in Loss and Damage Reporting

• Standards - National and global statistics significantly suffer from the lack of internationally agreed upon definitions and accounting practices for aggregation (downstream, such as data duplication and wrong attribution) and analysis of loss data which can lead to under/overestimating the total losses

• Authoritative and quality assured hydrometeorological event information - When impacts from a hydrometeorological hazard occur in a country, loss and damage information is recorded and aggregated based on a generally accepted or standardized national typology of events

• Context - In many cases the context of the recorded loss is not accurately associated in the event/impact attribution analysis (e.g. flood damage could be linked to a number of underlying factors such as heavy rain, tropical storm, riverine flooding from upstream heavy rains)

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Solutions

• NMHSs have an established capacity to monitor and record weather, water and climate event information

• NMHSs are mandated by their governments to monitor and forecast hydrometeorological hazards

• The WMO is the leading authority on naming and definitions of hydrometeorological and climate hazards

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Resolution 9 (Cg-17) IDENTIFIERS FOR CATALOGUING EXTREME WEATHER, WATER AND CLIMATE EVENTS

Decides to standardize weather, water, climate, space weather and other

related environmental hazard and risk information and develop identifiers

for cataloguing weather, water and climate extreme events;

Requests the Executive Council to provide oversight on the standardization

of hazard information for loss and damage assessment;

Requests the Commission for Basic Systems to develop, in collaboration

with all technical commissions and regional associations, a proposal on

standardized identifiers for cataloguing hazardous events for consideration

by the Executive Council;

Requests the Secretary-General to take the necessary actions, within the

available budgetary resources, to facilitate the work on this important

issue.

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Who are the users

• WMO Members - their reporting of Loss and damage data processes

• Loss and damage information stakeholders (including loss and damage data recording, aggregation, analysis and reporting)

– National

– Regional

– Global

– Private industry (e.g. insurance and infrastructure sectors)

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Goals of the Cataloging Initiative

• Strengthening Members capabilities to record weather, climate, water and space weather events in a systematic way

• WMO’s contribution to the monitoring of the global agenda through an empirical science based approach

• Strengthening of Member disaster management capacities and MHEWS through improved risk based information

• Strengthening of WMO leadership related to hydrometeorological and climate related hazards through provision of an agreed upon list of types of events associated with impacts

• Strengthening partnerships with the stakeholders of the loss and damage community

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Accomplishments To-date

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Who Contributed to this Proposal?

• WMO Members

• Technical Commissions

– CBS, CCl, CHy

– CAgM and JCOMM are now apart of the IPTT-CWWCE

• Regional Associations

– RA 6 (DWD RCC) , RA V (Indonesia, Australia, Philippines) so far…

• WMO Expert teams

– CCl Task Team on Definitions of Extreme Weather and Climate Events (TT-

DEWCE)

– DRR WG on Hazard Risk Assessment (DRR WG HRA)

– DRR WG on Multi-Hazard Early Warning Systems (DRR WG-MHEWS)

– EUMETNET Meteoalarm Expert Group

• WMO Secretariat

– Weather and Disaster Risk Reduction Service Department (WDS)

– Climate and Water Department (CLW)

• Many experts from diverse fields related to loss and damage accounting

(e.g. UNISDR, CRED, MunichRE, etc. 8

What has been accomplished?

1) Establishment on an Inter-Program Task Team

In 2016, EC Decision 4 (EC-68) endorsed the EC-WG/DRR

proposal to establish an Inter-Programme Task Team on

Cataloguing Extreme Weather, Water and Climate Events

(IPTT-CWWCE) as a coordination mechanism co-chaired

by the Commission for Basic Systems (CBS) and the

Commission for Climatology (CCl).

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2) International Workshop on Cataloguing and Managing

Information on Extreme Weather, Water and Climate Events

November 2017, Geneva

Convened by CCl and CBS with

participants from both communities,

EC-WG/HRA, EC-WG/MHEWS, CRED,

UNISDR as well as several subject matter

experts.

Key Outcome

A draft proposal for an approach for

responding to Res.9 (Cg-17) with

endorsement by IPTT-CEWWCE

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3) Formal discussion at RA-VI, February 2018

RA-VI, February 2018 Decided to test the proposed approach for

cataloguing high impact events and to provide recommendations

relevant for operationalization of the approach

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4) WMO Regional Association VI Test Phase Kickoff

Meeting

1. The RA-VI held a kickoff meeting on 7 July

2018 at DWD in Offenbach, Germany

2. Participated by 20 countries to develop

implementation guidance to test the

proposal.

3. Participants agreed that the test phase for

cataloguing of high impact events should be

based on agreed upon principles; including:

4) Continued: RA-VI Test Phase Principles

a. Keep it simple and feasible consider the costs,

resource and time to implement

b. Preserve the right of each country to state how they

choose to record and warn for hazards

c. Do not categorise hazards or events into groups

(e.g. , meteorological, hydrological, climate)

d. Initially restrict to Hydro-meteorological hazards

e. Do NOT quantify and qualify hazard definition or

express its severity (e.g. extreme, heavy, high)

f. Align to the Common Alert Protocol (CAP) for

warnings to avoid duplication, confusion and

misinterpretation

5) The Approach

• Centres on identifying events uniquely, while at the same time being able to group together events which are hydro-meteorologically related;

• Involves assigning a universally unique identifier (UUID) number to each event including key attributes of the event into a data record; and,

• Includes an Events List - A standard living list defining typology of events that could have impact on society.

• Enables the linking of events (e.g. a cyclone, leading to heavy rain, strong winds, storm surge flooding and landslides) to better reflect the larger system (synoptic scale).

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- Record creation

- Event start

- Event end

Date & Time

- Area Recognized spatial datatype

(e.g. Geodatabase, shapefile)

- Event type From WMO Event Types list

- Linkage UUID reference link to related events

(e.g. Storm)

- Description of event Open text description of event

(e.g. winds 45 knots gusting to 55 knots)

- Status Status of record

(i.e. in progress / complete)

Event

Key Event Attributes Description

- Event Identifier UUID - 32 Character random sequence

- Originator Originator (name of institution that is

recording the event)

Asso

ciate

d Im

pa

cts Info

rma

tion

Warnings• Hazard

• Time of event

• Affected area

• Severity

• Short description

Climatological• Hazard

• Time of event

• Severity (Climate

extreme)

RSMC’s / RCC’s

GMAS

Database

Climate

Event

Database

WMO

Hazards

Database

NMHS Analog

CAP,

Manual reporting Climate Watch

System (CWS)***

Feedback for

Forecast and warning

improvements

Feedback for

climate monitoring

improvementsLC*

* Possible Lead Center for global hazard information

** CDMS: Information on historical climate records

*** CWS: Information on ongoing and foreseen high impact events

Na

tion

al

Re

gio

na

lG

lob

al

Data Management

System (CDMS) )**

Layering of Information Enables New

Possibilities for Analysis and Application

Example of applications

• Tracking global policy indicators

• Risk management (public and private sector)– Risk identification (hazard component, empirical methodology

of understanding hazards, how hazards interact with other hazards and their combined impacts)

– Risk reduction (e.g. empirical methodology to quantify past events as input to developing building standards, land use planning, strengthening MHEWS and disaster planning )

– Risk transfer (insurance, risk facilities, cat bonds)

• Research– Tracking event trends in event frequency, severity and

distribution

– On causal contributions of hazards, exposure and vulnerability to losses

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“If we succeed in implementing this solution we

will have done a great service for humankind”

Julio Serje

UNISDR

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Thank you

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WMO Cataloging Initiative

Geneva, Switzerland

Meeting of the

Inter-Programme Task Team on Cataloguing Extreme

Weather, Water and Climate Events (IPTT-CWWCE)

18-19 February 2018

The WMO Cataloging Proposal

James Douris

Multi-Hazard Early Warning Services Division

WMO

- Record creation

- Event start

- Event end

Date & Time

- Area Recognized spatial datatype

(e.g. Geodatabase, shapefile)

- Event type From WMO Event Types list

- Linkage UUID reference link to related events

(e.g. Storm)

- Description of event Open text description of event

(e.g. winds 45 knots gusting to 55 knots)

- Status Status of record

(i.e. in progress / complete)

Event

Key Event Attributes Description

- Event Identifier UUID - 32 Character random sequence

- Originator Originator (name of institution that is

recording the event)

Table.1 - Event Attributes , Field with * is mandatory for recording

Parameter Format Description Comments

Event Identifier Alphanumeric number UUID (32 character random sequence)

Originator* Text Name of institution that is recording the event Institution that is recording the event

Record Creation* Date/Timestamp Date- and time-stamp of event onset

Start Time* Date/Timestamp Time of when the event started

End Time* Date/Timestamp Time of when the event ended

Event Type* List Controlled list – see Table 2 below Source of event (e.g. tropical cyclone) or primary

(list of primary events)

Area* Recognized spatial

datatype

Spatial area Recognized spatial format

Description Text (Up to 500

characters)

Open description text. Description of event such as

max temp, highest wind speed, category, severity,

and any other information that can assist

attribution of loss and damages.

Highly recommended to enter.

Linkage Alphanumeric number

strings

UUID reference link to source events UUID of other events considered as source

events (e.g. Tropical cyclone)

Status Indicate status of record Not started / Ongoing / Completed/Validated

Event Attributes

Cascading Event RecordsEvent UUID: random string of 32 characters

National

(e.g. Germany)

Regional(e.g. Europe)

Convective

Heavy rain

Flooding

Cyclonic

Strong gale

Glo

ba

l (a

d h

oc

an

aly

sis)

3b3a30ec-03f3-445d-8f86-76cb5447e9ee

0882b06f-ed9a-40d2-9f96-df0da7130ee9

114bd279-dde4-48c9-b20d-db1c967bfa4c

3fdaa43c-51d0-414f-a26a-e23de203aa76

f3df3f02-7574-4ffe-beea-021af820bc47

WMO Events List

• Initial list of event types with which losses and damage are potentially associated

• Authoritative list of event types that is non-technical and practical which will facilitate standardization of event terminology that is under the mandate of the WMO.

• Not intended to be a hierarchical list based on causalities but to be a flat list to facilitate observation and recording

• Can be amended by countries and regions through the appropriate WMO governance mechanism

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Precipitation related

Acid rain

Blizzard

Drought

Dry Spell

Extreme precipitation

Hail

Heavy rain

Hydrological drought

Ice Storm

Meteorological drought

Rain

Snow

Snowstorm

Wet Spell

Wind related

Cyclone

Gale

Hurricane

Squall

Storm

Subtropical storm

Tropical cyclone

Tropical storm

Tornado

Typhoon

Wind

Convective related

Downburst

Lighting

Thunderstorms

Temperature related

Cold wave

Heat wave

Hoar frost

Icing

Terrestrial related

Avalanche

Coastal flood

Estuarine flood

Flash flood

Flood

Fluvial (riverine) flood

Ice and debris-jam flood

Landslide/Mudslide

Mudflow

Snowmelt flood

Marine related

Storm surge

Tsunami

Pressure related

Depression or cyclone low,

low pressure area

Extra-tropical cyclone

Lithometeor related

Black carbon

Brown clouds

Dust storm

Fog

Haze

Pollen pollution episode

Polluted air

Sand storm

Sand storm/Dust storm

Sand haze

Space weather related

Coronal mass ejections

Geomagnetic storms

Ionospheric storms

Radio blackout

Solar energetic particles

Solar flares

Solar radiation storm

Event

Types List

by

Category

Thank you

27

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The global agenda highlights tracking losses and damages associated with extreme

events:

• The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals,

• The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Paris Agreement,

The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, and

• The Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage.

The United Nations Sustainable Development Goals SDG No.11

and No.13:

Significantly reduce the number of deaths and the number of people affected and

substantially decrease the direct economic losses caused by disasters, including

water-related disasters, with a focus on protecting the poor and people in vulnerable

situations

Strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and

natural disasters in all countries

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Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction The Sendai Framework aims to guide the multi-hazard management of disaster risk in

development at all levels as well as within and across all sectors. The Sendai Framework set

several targets to be achieved by 2030, including a substantial reduction of global disaster

mortality, the number of affected people and direct disaster economic loss through, inter

alia, the increase in the availability of and access to multi-hazard early warning systems and

disaster risk information and assessments.

The Paris Agreement Parties recognize the importance of averting, minimizing and addressing loss and

damage associated with the adverse effects of climate change, including extreme weather

events and slow onset events, and the role of sustainable development in reducing the risk

of loss and damage.

The Warsaw International Mechanism on Loss and Damage The Warsaw international mechanism on loss and damage associated with impacts of

climate change, including extreme events and slow onset events facilitates and promotes,

inter-alia, understanding of and expertise in approaches to address loss and damage

associated with the adverse effects of climate change, and the collection, sharing,

management and use of relevant data and information

WORK AREAS AS ENDORSED BY EC-68

FOR CATALOGUING AND MANAGING INFORMATION ON EXTREME WEATHER, WATER AND

CLIMATE EVENTS

(a) A typology of the events that would be catalogued and receive unique

identifiers (such as droughts, different kinds of floods, heat/cold waves,

various types of storms and severe weather, space weather, etc. An initial list

of hazard event types has been identified);

(b) Indices and parameters used/recommended for characterizing and

recording each type of event (i.e. its magnitude, location, timing and

duration);

(c) A coding scheme and governance mechanism for assigning a unique

identifier to each event,

(d) Database management systems for recording/cataloguing the events (how

the data about the events are stored so that they can be accessed using the

unique identifier once it has been assigned).

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