Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte prefers visual warning rather than sophisticated but expensive river sensors to detect impending flashfloods from the city’s rivers.
“Let us go visual” said the City Mayor in answer to questions on which flood warning system she would prefer during a press conference at The Marco Polo Davao last February 15.
“We have designated watchers who will periodically check the water level and coordinate it with the chief of police.” Duterte said.
She added that sensor technology is still untested, adding that manual visual warnings are more reliable. Among the areas where the manual systems are put in place are rivers in Calinan and Marilog.
Last December ICT Davao, a group of IT stakeholders, came up with a proposal to develop the prototype system of sophisticated GPS river sensors whose findings could be sent to SMS and social media sites in real time.
However, early this year, City Planning and Development Officer Roberto Alabado said the City Government prefers manual river alarms as he found the cost of securing modern river sensors as too expensive. Of the four prototype river sensors, three were looted with only one model still functioning. [PIA 11/RG Alama]
