Tajikistan Holds Practical Workshop on the THAW Satellite Tool for Monitoring Mountain Lakes and GLOF Risks
On 21 August, a practical workshop took place on the Transient Hydrologic Anomalies Weekly (THAW) tool, aimed at strengthening national capacities for the detection and monitoring of newly formed and anomalously changing mountain lakes. The workshop was organized by the Agency for Hydrometeorology of the Committee for Environmental Protection under the Government of the Republic of Tajikistan, in cooperation with the UNESCO Regional Office in Almaty and the University of Zurich, as part of the regional project “Reducing vulnerabilities of populations in the Central Asia region from glacier lake outburst floods in a changing climate” (GLOFCA), implemented by UNESCO and funded by the Adaptation Fund.
The workshop brought together scientists and specialists from the Agency for Hydrometeorology, the State Institution “Institute for the Study of Glaciers and Cryosphere” of the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan, and the Institute of Water Problems, Hydropower and Ecology of the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan.
THAW is an automated tool for monitoring surface water bodies that combines Sentinel-1 Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite data with the Google Earth Engine platform. By flagging lakes that require closer attention, the tool supports the timely identification of potential outburst hazards and contributes to more effective GLOF monitoring.
During the practical sessions, participants worked in groups to apply THAW to selected glacier basins in Central Asia, testing its use for identifying potentially emerging lakes. Sessions also covered how to validate the results generated by the tool and assess whether individual lakes require further monitoring.
Discussions placed particular emphasis on exchanging experience and identifying the practical needs of specialists working on mountain lake monitoring and Glacial Lake Outburst Flood (GLOF) early warning systems. The outcomes of these discussions will feed into the continued development of the systems, protocols, and tools supported under the GLOFCA project.
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