COVER STORY • 封面專題 2023 UMAGAZINE 27 • 澳大新語 29 As the populations of major cities continue to grow, the challenges facing the maintenance and operation of civil infrastructure have become more and more complex. In particular, the reduction of safety hazards and mitigation of natural disasters are two alarming contemporary issues. In view of this, a research group on public safety and disaster prevention of the University of Macau’s (UM) State Key Laboratory of Internet of Things for Smart City (SKL-IOTSC) studies the marine disaster chain caused by extreme weather events in coastal cities, and strives to build an intelligent maintenance and risk assessment system for monitoring structural health and issuing early warnings, in order to protect the lives of urban residents. Studying the Marine Disaster Chain in Coastal Cities Cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) are located on the westward path of typhoons originating in the Western Pacific. During typhoon season, these cities are frequently hit by typhoons and may experience severe urban floods, landslides, and other secondary disasters. With storm surges and geotechnical hazards as the focus, the researchers conduct simulations and risk assessments to study the marine disaster chain caused by extreme weather events in coastal cities. SKL-IOTSC inaugurated the UM Satellite Ground Station in February 2023. The station can receive data from meteorological satellites and high-definition satellites, which greatly improves the observation accuracy for detecting key elements of disasters as well as regional mobile detection capability. The establishment of the station also marked the deep integration of marine science, the Internet of Things, and remote sensing technology, which can facilitate future studies on topics such as climate change, typhoons and rainstorms, the marine environment, and air pollution in coastal cities. The group built the Urban Flooding Simulation Platform to collect various data. The data include the results of hydrodynamic processes that simulate storm surge events, information about tide levels and relevant warning signals, the spatiotemporal distribution of surface flood flows, the measurements at each meteorological and hydrological station, as well as the spatiotemporal distribution and depth of ood discharges in the underground pipe network during ood events. These data help researchers better understand the marine disaster chain and improve the integrated capability of coastal cities in disaster response. Assessing Structural Safety in a Timely Manner The group is committed to exploring the impact of natural disasters on people, vehicles, and important fundamental facilities in an urban environment. The researchers have conducted many cutting-edge studies on topics such as structural health monitoring, intelligent operations, and intelligent maintenance, with the goal of enhancing the resilience of coastal cities. Many of them have received grants from national or provincial research funds and have achieved fruitful results. To monitor the health of civil infrastructure, the group 周萬歡教授 Prof Zhou Wanhuan 實驗室對極端天氣條件下濱海城市海洋災害鏈開展模擬及風險評估 SKL-IOTSC researchers carry out simulations and risk assessments to study the marine disaster chain caused by extreme weather events in coastal cities
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