Dr. Yang tells us this is a process that evolves over time, as the data become clearer and clearer. From rainfall amount and watershed area to dam height and storage capacity, every parameter has to be calibrated repeatedly to ultimately calculate how much water the barrier lake can hold and when it will fill up.
Figuring out when the barrier lake will be filled is just the first step. What's even more important is to assess how much water will rush downstream when it breaches and which areas may be flooded as a result.
Dr. Yang explains that if the weather stays calm, water will slowly overflow in stages. But if a typhoon hits with heavy rain, water keeps pouring in and keeps scouring the dam. The destructive power of these two scenarios is worlds apart. Dr. Yang conducts hydraulic modeling for different scenarios to estimate possible flood zones and water level changes.
As principal investigator, Dr. Li compiles the team's investigation data, monitoring information, and analysis results, transforming the raw data into disaster risk assessment reports.
These reports are provided to FANCA and relevant agencies as the basis for issuing warnings and making evacuation decisions.
Throughout the entire disaster prevention process, the DPWE team is responsible for monitoring and interpreting the data, while evacuation planning and on-site emergency response are handled by the government.
Living with nature
To install flood early warning system monitoring stations upstream of Matai'an Creek, Prof. Chao and his team drove for several hours to Hualien. Then, they switched vehicles and drove a pickup truck onto a forest road. It was the night before a typhoon hit. The truck bounced along through the mud, with the constant sound of Matai'an Creek rushing in their ears.
Racing against the typhoon's arrival, the team dug holes in the darkness, buried instruments, and set up solar panels. On the way back, they saw a hundred-pace viper lying across the middle of the road.
"The hundred-pace viper is considered a mountain deity by locals. Even indigenous residents, who know the mountains well, don't encounter them easily," Prof. Chao says in amazement. The snake was coiled in the middle of the road and watched the team for a while. Then, it slowly moved aside.
Prof. Chao recalls that in all his years of fieldwork, this was the first time he had encountered a hundred-pace viper. It didn't rain that night. The monitoring station was successfully installed, and on the way back, they had even met the mountain deity.
Dr. Li is stationed in eastern Taiwan. After Typhoon Ragasa hit last September, the team launched high-intensity follow-up monitoring work on the Matai'an Creek barrier lake. When asked about that period, he shared a harrowing story.
On the day of Mid-Autumn Festival, he had finished a disaster response meeting in northern Taiwan and drove back east with his family. The fatigue from working day after day suddenly caught up with him and he lost consciousness. When he woke up, the car had careened halfway into a ditch beside the road, and all the airbags had deployed. Fortunately, the whole family was safe.
DPWE's work extends across Taiwan. Prof. Chao's monitoring system sends real-time landslide alerts to frontline emergency responders. Dr. Li has extensive mountain survey experience and once trekked mountain trails for eight days and seven nights to investigate the safety of the Batongguan Historic Trail.
Meanwhile, Dr. Yang's smart flood prevention platform integrates 84 pumping stations across New Taipei City, using AI to predict flood risks.
Disasters rarely happen the way we expect. "Dealing with uncertainty is just part of everyday disaster prevention work," Chief Director Chih-Ping Lin of the DPWE tells us. Because of this, disaster prevention workers need more than just technical skills. They also need cross-disciplinary collaboration, a resilience mindset, and the ability to work with uncertainty.
"We are not trying to control nature. We are trying to live alongside it," Prof. Lin says. "What matters is real-time monitoring and dynamic decision-making that allows us to minimize losses and recover quickly when disasters strike."
From barrier lakes to typhoons and earthquakes to debris flows, every disaster tests our ability to coexist with nature.
To face these uncertainties, the scientists are dedicated to providing early warning systems that are truly effective and building a resilient social system. Keys to their success include the monitoring data sent back late at night and the researchers traveling back and forth to field sites.
The NYCU Center for Disaster Prevention and Water Environment Research returned to Hualien to support emergency response efforts for the landslide-dammed lake on Wanli Creek.
