Flood risk mitigation in developing countries: deriving accurate topographic data for remote areas under severe time and economic constraints

Isla Hispaniola, the island shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic, has repeatedly witnessed catastrophic disasters that caused dramatic economic losses and killed thousands of people over the last decades. One striking example is the disastrous flood event that hit the transnational basin of River Soliette on 24 May 2004. The event resulted from a severe tropical storm and killed over 1000 Haitian and 400 Dominican people. In the context of an International Cooperation Initiative, the University of Bologna led several activities in the fields of flood risk assessment, management and mitigation, and sustainable development planning for the Soliette river basin. This paper presents new techniques for a timely assessment of flood risk in data-scarce and remote areas in developing countries showing in particular: (1) Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-based topographic survey of the Soliette riverbed, carried out under urgent temporal, logistical and technical constraints, and (2) some possible utilisations of the collected topographic data for the identification of structural and non-structural flood risk mitigation measures. The analysis enabled us to set and test a GNSS-based technique for fast, reliable and detailed topographic surveys in remote regions, which represents a valid option for similar areas with limited accessibility in emerging and developing countries.