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J. Fluixá-Sanmartín et al.
political changes in the local government of Carhuaz—resulted in a lack of comprehensive assessment of the social and political situation of the areas of intervention, and contributed to the delay in the process of implementation of certain
activities and challenged the sustainability of the EWS.
3. Recurrent technical problems in the EWS causing a delay in its final operation. The proper operational functioning of the different components of the
implemented EWS is highly challenging in such extreme conditions in high
mountains. Several persistent technical problems (bad or null signal reception
between the stations, failures due to lightning impacts, energy problems, etc.)
repeatedly disturbed the operation of the system. This led to unexpected expenses,
change of sensors and their disposition, and a lack of data for defining warning
thresholds for the geophones signals. A proper diagnosis of the problems and an
integral correction of the system scheme were then needed.
4. The alarm module of the system (sirens and their corresponding infrastructure, permanent surveillance in the municipality, etc.) was not yet implemented. This task was in the responsibility of the Municipality of Carhuaz. It
is planned to install one or two long-range sirens to cover the entire area of the
city of Carhuaz. In addition, the system has the possibility to send out predefined
text messages to district leaders in parallel to the acoustic alarm. The populated
places further up in the catchment are not included in the acoustic alarm concept at the current stage. However, they could be included in the described SMS
service, given the coverage of the signal.
5. Geophones’ thresholds for the activation of the different warning levels were
not yet defined. At the end of the first phase of the project, the system was not
yet fully operational (even if it has been tested on several occasions) because
the thresholds for the geophone measurements described above that indicates
when a warning level is activated were not established yet. In this test phase,
three different thresholds were to be defined to make sure that smaller events
got registered as well (lowermost threshold) and to have a direct indication of
the size of the event, depending on only one, two, or even all three thresholds
are overshot. For this, historical records of the geophones had to be taken into
account, and data analysis had to be applied to them as well.
6. Further involvement of other technical fields such as electronic engineering
is required. The multiple technical problems identified in the EWS, most of
them caused by unexpected power source issues and deficiencies on the sensors
and transmission devices, could have been solved or even avoided if an initial
well-designed scheme had been elaborated which relates back to missing local
experience. This could also lead to a more participative role of universities and/or
research platforms on the conception and design of this (or other) EWS, benefiting
both the technical aspects of the project and potential research initiatives.
7. Toward a multipurpose project. When assessing the scope of the EWS in the
context of the “Glaciares 513” project, a broader perspective of adaptation to
effects of climate change results in an integration of risk reduction and water
resource management in the light of dwindling water resources from shrinking
glaciers. Multipurpose projects have the objective to integrate both perspectives
J. Fluixá-Sanmartín et al.
political changes in the local government of Carhuaz—resulted in a lack of comprehensive assessment of the social and political situation of the areas of intervention, and contributed to the delay in the process of implementation of certain
activities and challenged the sustainability of the EWS.
3. Recurrent technical problems in the EWS causing a delay in its final operation. The proper operational functioning of the different components of the
implemented EWS is highly challenging in such extreme conditions in high
mountains. Several persistent technical problems (bad or null signal reception
between the stations, failures due to lightning impacts, energy problems, etc.)
repeatedly disturbed the operation of the system. This led to unexpected expenses,
change of sensors and their disposition, and a lack of data for defining warning
thresholds for the geophones signals. A proper diagnosis of the problems and an
integral correction of the system scheme were then needed.
4. The alarm module of the system (sirens and their corresponding infrastructure, permanent surveillance in the municipality, etc.) was not yet implemented. This task was in the responsibility of the Municipality of Carhuaz. It
is planned to install one or two long-range sirens to cover the entire area of the
city of Carhuaz. In addition, the system has the possibility to send out predefined
text messages to district leaders in parallel to the acoustic alarm. The populated
places further up in the catchment are not included in the acoustic alarm concept at the current stage. However, they could be included in the described SMS
service, given the coverage of the signal.
5. Geophones’ thresholds for the activation of the different warning levels were
not yet defined. At the end of the first phase of the project, the system was not
yet fully operational (even if it has been tested on several occasions) because
the thresholds for the geophone measurements described above that indicates
when a warning level is activated were not established yet. In this test phase,
three different thresholds were to be defined to make sure that smaller events
got registered as well (lowermost threshold) and to have a direct indication of
the size of the event, depending on only one, two, or even all three thresholds
are overshot. For this, historical records of the geophones had to be taken into
account, and data analysis had to be applied to them as well.
6. Further involvement of other technical fields such as electronic engineering
is required. The multiple technical problems identified in the EWS, most of
them caused by unexpected power source issues and deficiencies on the sensors
and transmission devices, could have been solved or even avoided if an initial
well-designed scheme had been elaborated which relates back to missing local
experience. This could also lead to a more participative role of universities and/or
research platforms on the conception and design of this (or other) EWS, benefiting
both the technical aspects of the project and potential research initiatives.
7. Toward a multipurpose project. When assessing the scope of the EWS in the
context of the “Glaciares 513” project, a broader perspective of adaptation to
effects of climate change results in an integration of risk reduction and water
resource management in the light of dwindling water resources from shrinking
glaciers. Multipurpose projects have the objective to integrate both perspectives