EWS Workshop 2009

Date: 9.-10. February 2009

Early Warning System for Transportation Infrastructures

Extension of deadline: please see "Call for Paper"!

Objective of the workshop: Early warning for natural disasters becomes an increasingly important tool for disaster mitigation.
Earthquake early warning for railway systems is currently practised in Japan, but has much higher potential in other parts of the world. This workshop attempts to wrap up the current experience and determine the current and future potential of implementing early warning systems world-wide. This includes the understanding of limitations and perspectives of the current technologies, the options for incorporating early warning in the security practise of railway operation, and value-adding to early warning by linking it to structural health monitoring. Beyond the risks of earthquakes, early warning for other scenarios like landslides or rock fall are also of interest.

Topics of interest:

• Existing Early Warning Systems -- performance, experience, future potential.
• Potential of early warning (in particular for ground transportation systems).
• Information technology and sensor systems for early warning.
• Structural health monitoring of transportation infrastructure and early warning.

The results of the workshop will shortly be available in a Proceedings Volume.

Project partners:

• Department of Railway Systems of University of Karlsruhe
• Geophysical Institute of University of Karlsruhe
• Fraunhofer IITB