The Civil Defence Commission (CDC) is combining hydrology, hydraulics and computer technology in its latest training session to generate data about flooding and mitigating its effects.

The session started on Tuesday and will continue until July 13, a press release from the Government Information Agency (GINA) said. The session is being held jointly by the CDC, the US Southern Command and the US Army Corps of Engineers.

The initial groundwork for the exercise, which is being done during the first week, is being hosted at the Centre for Information Technology at the University of Guyana (UG). Members from the CDC, the Hydromet Service, the Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission and UG will be involved in this segment of the workshop. The second week of activities will involve simulation exercises, culminating with a seminar that Head of the Presidential Secretariat Dr Roger Luncheon and other government functionaries are expected to attend.

In an interview US army senior hydraulics engineers Mark Jensen and Stanford Gibson said they hoped that at the end of the two-week training and simulation exercises, participants would be able to use software to determine when and where flooding will occur, the extent thereof, and by extension establish a warning time by which to alert citizens and the government to take precautionary measures.
Additionally, CDC Operations and Training Officer Captain Kester Craig said he hopes the UG lecturers trained to use the technology will pass on the information to students and over time, the institution can seek to formulate and deliver an academic programme in this discipline.