EMMA

Objectives

EMMA (European Multi service Meteorological Awareness) and the Meteoalarm web page represent one of the most successful and visible achievements of EUMETNET. EMMA has improved national and European multi-hazard warning systems over the last decade by developing standards, and has deepened the cooperation with partners like civil protection, the DRR community and the water sector. Meteoalarm has been operational since 2007 and the website has generated large public interest.

The objectives of EMMA are:

  • To show the most relevant information on Meteoalarm needed to prepare for extreme weather and related hazards expected to occur somewhere over Europe.
  • Provision of warnings understandable by all actors from the private and public sector. Warnings are multilingual and harmonized as far as possible, whereas the four level color code is seen as understandable “language“.
  • The Meteoalarm web page provides a one-stop shop and a repository for multi-hazard warnings.
  • Research and Development: harmonization of the warnings towards impact oriented warnings.
  • Support of the regional cross-border collaboration between forecasters.
  • Networking and coordination with relevant organizations like Civil Protection Organizations and ERCC the Emergency Response and Coordination Centre of the European Commission
  • EMMA provides the basis for knowledge transfer to other regions and the service delivery improvement of developing weather services.
  • “We travel more frequently, either on business or privately, and the exposure to risks abroad is greater than at home. Meteoalarm integrates all important severe weather information over Europe originating from the official National Public Weather Services across all participating European countries - ensuring that information is presented consistently to allow for coherent interpretation as widely as possible, with easy accessibility across languages and culture.”

The tasks

Collection and online publication of the authoritative warning information for meteorological and hydrological hazards delivered by 37 (as of 2018) National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs) in 33 languages across the European domain for the next 48 hours.

Consistent presentation of the information to ensure coherent interpretation as widely as possible throughout Europe.

Technical quality control of the incoming messages and display of this information on maps with European, national and regional levels.

Operation of Meteoalarm as one-stop shop and a repository for relevant multi-hazard warnings to be used e.g. by professionals or tourists on a European scale. Re-user are able to acquire warning data from RSS and CAP (Common Alert Protocol) feeds or alternatively the alert hub.

Harmonization of the warnings as much as national procedures allow any adaptation with thresholds based on climatologically chosen regions and impact considerations.

Provision of a platform for meteorologists and hydrologists to discuss a consistent and harmonized system of warnings across Europe.

Comprehensive relaunch of Meteoalarm. The modernization and redesign of the whole system with improved functionality will give Meteoalarm a contemporary professional on-line presence, thus enhance the visibility of EUMETNET and the participating members and improve the accessibility of their authoritative warnings.

 

The organisation

The current phase of EMMA started in January 2019 and will last until the end of 2023. The Coordinating Member is ZAMG (Austria). The Programme Manager is Rainer Kaltenberger. The EMMA Team is advised by the Meteoalarm Expert Group

For questions about EMMA please contact meteoalarm@zamg.ac.at

Further Information

For further information, please go to the MeteoAlarm web page.