Success Story: Bukovec Dam Early Warning System

Success Story: Bukovec Dam Early Warning System

Name of the Project: Bukovec Dam Early Warning System
Location: Bukovec Dam – Košice, Slovakia
Total Number of Sirens: 6 Pavian sirens
Date of Last Installation: 2016
Goal of the Project: Flood protection of the local population within the endangered area

Bukovec is a water reservoir situated only 15 km away from the second largest city in Slovakia – Kosice. The main purpose of the waterworks is to supply potable water for the city of Kosice by balancing fluctuating flow quantities in the Kosice common waterline; however, it also provides water for activities such as irrigation, industrial use and protects the city by suppressing floods in the area.

It was put into operation in 1975 with a volume of 25 million m3, and it is not open to the general public.
The burst of the dam can cause flooding to as large an area as 95 km2, including nine adjacent villages and other inhabited areas. The height of the inundation wave could reach 16.1 m in these areas. Therefore, it is of crucial importance that a total of over 5,000 inhabitants are notified of any impending danger in due time and are instructed accordingly in case of the evacuation of civilians of the area.

Warning system description

There is a dam management centre in the immediate vicinity of the dam, with computers equipped with Vektra® monitoring technology, back-up batteries, a local control unit (LCU11), and one Pavian siren. Additionally, five other Pavian sirens are installed in the endangered area, warning the inhabitants in the area against a possible inundation wave for as long as 1 hour after the emergency situation arises (the dam failure).

The Vektra® software application (the Warning, Monitoring, and Notification modules) greatly automates all routine operations that operators carry out in emergency situations. The monitoring system identifies the dam failure early and reliably on the one hand, but it is also extremely resistant to false alarms on the other hand.

Vektra® Monitoring collects, sorts out, evaluates, and displays information from the installed sensors. When the parameters being monitored exceed the allowed values (an emergency is detected), Vektra® automatically notifies the operator of the emergency situation by displaying a pop-up window on screen and accompanying it with an acoustic signal.

During the operator’s inspection of the area and their absence in the control room, they have a mobile phone application by means of which they can activate the sirens or prevent their activation.

Besides the activation of the early warning and notification system using Vektra®, sirens can be activated by a local control unit (LCU11-W), connected directly to the siren in the control centre or through the national warning system.

What is more, the sirens can be activated individually by the Vektra® Warning system and the responsible persons notified by the Vektra® Notification system, independently of the interconnection of the systems with Vektra® Monitoring.