Many people live in flood-prone areas

And as the world’s population grew by 18.6% from 2000 to 2015, the population grew in these areas, increasing by 34.1% over the same period. This means that between 58 million and 86 million others have experienced flooding in those areas for 15 years.

“It’s not surprising that floods will increase,” he said Beth Tellman, The originator of the map of the beginning of the flood Cloud to Street is the lead author of the study. “But what was amazing to me was that people were moving to places where we had seen floods in the past.”

The researchers observed more than 3,000 cases in Dartmouth Flood Management database, which refers to the flood that was reported in the news media. It was similar to an event that featured location information and satellite images from FASHION, a tool consisting of two NASA satellites that have photographed the earth since 2000.

The researchers used a map of how flooding occurred by selecting pixels that were covered with water and those that were not. He then added the population to see how flood areas have changed over time.

Low-income and middle-income countries are the fastest growing areas in flood-prone areas over the past 20 years, which are increasing in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

Economic conditions can explain another trend, Tellman’s. Vulnerable groups have no choice but to settle in floodplains, where the environment can be cheap and easily accessible.

Using satellite imagery, the researchers were able to more accurately predict flood damage than previous species. Images can capture other types of flood waters, such as those that occur around rivers and on the coast. But for some it is caused by heavy rain or sudden events – such as the breaking of dams, or a storm with high waves – satellite imagery provides a clearer picture.

Floods with 913 maps are just a few of the thousands that occur worldwide each year. “It’s just the tip of the iceberg,” Tellman says.

MODIS takes pictures up to 250 meters, approximately the length of two football fields. This means that researchers could not map out the floodwaters or live in many cities. Clouds also disrupted image processing, and since satellites traversed other parts of the earth only once or twice a day, they also disappeared for a short time.

New weapons are becoming more flexible and can be seen in the clouds, he says Bessie Wakuda, cofounder and CEO of Cloud to Street. These tools, along with artificial intelligence, can cause flooding more accurately today. But in order to make water maps in chronological order, researchers had to stick to images from a single source, using expertise that has been around for a long time.

Efforts give scientists a clearer picture than any other factor that could affect the recent floods. The results will be particularly useful for consumers who are trying to predict risks, he says Philip Ward, who is studying flood surveys at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and has not participated in the study.