UMD Casts HydroNet to Predict, Prepare for Floods

Amid Annapolis’ picturesque Colonial-era buildings, brick-lined streets and sailboats gliding along the Severn River, a small solar-powered sensor perched atop a pylon just off City Dock is easy to miss.

The modest device, though, is the star of a new UMD project to track water levels in a city all too familiar with flooding. The Maryland HydroNet will be a series of more than 20 sensors along the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries that pump out data to help researchers and local government leaders predict when, where and how much flooding will occur.

“Projects such as the HydroNet are really the best symbol for what institutions of higher education like the University of Maryland can help accomplish,” UMD President Darryll J. Pines said during a June unveiling event with local leaders.

Led by atmospheric and oceanic science Associate Professor Tim Canty, the HydroNet is part of the university’s Climate Resilience Network, funded by a UMD Grand Challenges Grant to prepare communities for the impacts of climate change.

“This project is the first step in providing the state with a larger network of water-level monitors to help better allocate resources and prioritize assistance for communities facing the most imminent risk,” Canty says.