EVALUATION OF THE IMPACTS OF LACK OFGEOINFORMATION DATA IN CRISIS MANAGEMENT DURING THE 2018 KUWAIT FLOOD

Abstract. The State of Kuwait faced a catastrophic flood on the 9^th of November 2018 due to extraordinary rainfall of around 111mm in less than 6 hours. Such an extreme flood event has not been observed in Kuwait for the last 50 years. In this research, we attempt to understand the crisis management in Kuwait from a Geoinformatics perspective. Remote sensing and GIS were used to investigate the flood impacts and response efficiency in Kuwait city, Fahaheel city and Sabah Al-Ahmad city. A comparison was carried out based on the availability of Geoinformation data and tools, the response time for each city, and the number of recorded incidents. It was found that the response to the flood event was overall lacking, mainly due to the absence of accurate geoinformation data and the lack of real-time monitoring of the drainage network. In addition, the absence of a centralized crisis management authority in Kuwait that could coordinate the various related bodies involved in flood response aggravated the issue.