1. Name, Surname, Position Logo(s) Weather monitoring and forecasting over eastern Attica (Greece) in the frame of FLIRE project Vassiliki Kotroni (1), Konstantinos Lagouvardos (1), Nektarios Chrysoulakis (3), Christos Makropoulos (2), Maria Mimikou (2), Chrysoula Papathanasiou (2), and Dimitris Poursanidis (3) (1) NATIONAL OBSERVATORY OF ATHENS – INSTITUTE FOR ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT, (2) NATIONAL TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS, (3) FOUNDATION FOR RESEARCH AND TECHNOLOGY, INSTITUTE OF APPLIED AND COMPUTATIONAL MATHEMATICS, GREECE FLIRE objectives: Develop a Decision Support System (DSS) for integrated weather information management, forest fire management and floods information management. The aim is to support decision making of Civil Protection Agencies and local stakeholders in the area of east Attica (Greece) A flowchart summarizing the DSS The study area is the catchment area of Rafina city Adopted strategy for setting-up the operational weather forecasting chain that provides the weather forecasts for the FLIRE project needs 8 km24 km 2 km MM5 MM5 model is run once daily, initialized at 0000 UTC. Grid 1 simulation lasts 72 hours, Grid 2 starts at t+6 with a total simulation time of 66 h and finally Grid 3 starts at t+6, with a total simulation time of 42 h. Therefore Grid 3 provides every day detailed weather forecasts for the same day and the following day, at 1-h interval. EFWS This presentation is devoted to the data that are provided in the Weather Monitoring Management Tool of the FLIRE system that includes: Short term weather forecasts for the study area Weather station Real time Data Smart alerts for thunderstorms MM5 model is run once daily, initialized at 0000 UTC. Grid 1 simulation lasts 72 hours, Grid 2 starts at t+6 with a total simulation time of 66 h and finally Grid 3 starts at t+6, with a total simulation time of 42 h. Therefore Grid 3 provides every day detailed weather forecasts for the same day and the following day, at 1-h interval. The forecast verification is conducted for the rainfall events that have occurred from March 2013 up to December 2014 in the Greater Athens Area. For the selection of the events the following criteria have been applied: (a) at least one station to have recorded more than 20 mm of rain in 24 hours, (b) more than 3 surface meteorological stations have recorded rainfall (in order to avoid very local events). For the statistical evaluation, the precipitation observations from 21 rain gauges operated by the National Observatory of Athens (red bullets), and 10 rain gauges operated by the National Technical University of Athens (green bullets) are used for the verification. Validation of precipitation forecasts The forecast verification is conducted for the rainfall events that have occurred from March 2013 up to December 2014 in the Greater Athens Area (37 events). For the selection of the events the following criteria have been applied: (a) at least one station to have recorded more than 20 mm of rain in 24 hours, (b) more than 3 surface meteorological stations have recorded rainfall (in order to avoid very local events). datemax 24hrain #stations with rain 131 December 2014386 230 December 201424.613 317 December 201423.430 412 December 201460.437 511 December 201460.638 608 December 201468.636 714 November 2014218 808 November 201461.836 924 October 2014101.830 1023 October 201440.48 1116 September 201458.611 1209 September 201434.47 1307 September 201430.66 1419 July 201455.612 1515 July 2014628 1627 April 201455.815 1707 April 201424.46 1806 April 2014469 1903 March 201475.233 2001 March 201422.829 2128 February 201420.24 2228 January 201462.435 2326 January 20142830 2425 January 201428.816 2524 January 201437.620 2615 January 20145314 2727 December 201356.235 2802 December 201328.227 2924 November 201355.832 3021 November 201336.217 3114 November 20134035 3211 November 20139224 3306 November 201345.834 01 October 201326.217 3512 June 201350.414 3608 June 201345.44 3712 May 2013204 For the statistical evaluation, the precipitation observations from 44 rain gauges are used. The 24-h accumulated precipitation values (from t+24 up to t+48), so the model forecast for DAY2, are verified against the available rain gauges. Rain Thresholds in mm 12.551020 Areal Bias0.900.830.730.650.51 POD0.890.820.720.630.42 FAR0.01 0.040.17 CSI0.880.820.720.610.39 Rain Ranges in mm 0.2-2.52.5-55.-10.10. - 20.>20. QB0.28-0.5-1.6-3.6-14.4 MAE0.661.03.06.015.9 This research has been carried out under the Project FLIRE "FLoods and fIre Risk assessment and managEment". The project aims to develop a warning system for floods and fire risk management and is co-financed by European Commission General Directorate for the Environment, LIFE financial instrument with 50%. Surface stations network that provides real-time weather monitoring of the study area Smart alerts for thunderstorms in the study area  Every 15-min an automated procedure is executed at NOA, scanning ZEUS network data for lightning occurrence within a radius of 10 km and 20 km around the area of interest (east Attica).  The procedure provides a short file with a 0 indication for no lightning and 1 for lightning within 10 km radius and 2 for lightning within 20 km of radius.  This file is transferred to DSS every 15 min, for display. Image of the meteorological stations and the model domain from the Decision Support System graphical interface. Image of the meteorological forecasts of precipitation over the study domain from the Decision Support System graphical interface.