SAWIDREA

Satellite and Weather Information for Disaster Resilience

Hydro-meteorological hazards account for over 90% of natural disasters in East Africa, impacting most of the socio-economic sectors and afecting nearly every country in the region. Climate Change is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events such as foods, droughts and cyclones. SAWIDREA works to mitigate the impact of these hazards by building regional and national capacities in severe weather early warning systems.

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Our Areas of Work

Technical Training

SAWIDREA - ICPAC provides high-level technical training for experts in Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP), hydrological modelling and Disaster Risk Management for ICPAC member states. The training is conducted through short-term workshops (e.g training of trainers) and through longer term attachment of national experts to ICPAC’s office in Nairobi. The latter approach helps to build capacity of experts from member states as well as to improve the co-production of climate sevices between ICPAC and national institutions.

Support National Met Services with Computers and Power Storage

SAWIDREA has procured computing equipment (workstations laptops and server), software licences and two UPS (with power storage of 1 and 1.5 KVA) for 10 Meteorological Departments of the Greater Horn of Africa.

Support to Climate Outlook Forums

The Regional Climate Outlook Forum is a three-times a year platform that brings together climate scientists with users of climate information from different sectors (e.g agriculture and food security, water and energy, health, conflict and peace building, livestock and media). At the event, ICPAC provides the seasonal forecast and users analyze the consequences of the forecast on their respective sectors and generate advisories for each country and each sector.

Sharing of Numerical Weather Prediction data

The project is designed to produce high resolution Numerical Weather Prediction data, as well as to receive and assimilate satellite data. This data is shared with National Meteorological and Hydrological services in member states through ICPAC’s Geoportal (geoportal.icpac.net).

Installation of a RARS station to receive satellite data and improve the forecast

SAWIDREA will install a RARS (Regional Advanced Retransmission Systems) station at ICPAC’s offices in Nairobi to receive satellite data to improve the quality of the weather forecast.