THE FLOOD RISK
IN THE IALOMITA RIVER BASIN
CASE STUDY: THE JULY 1975 FLASH FLOOD
M. RETEGAN, MIHAELA BORCAN
ABSTRACT. Te flood risk in the Ialomita river basin case study: the july 1975 flash flood. Since over the last four decades the Ialomita River Basin has been affected by several catastrophic hydrological events, of which the most important were the ones in 1975, 2001 and 2005, for a better management of the extreme situations generated by such episodes we propose a new methodology regarding the estimation of the flash-flood appearance potential in this particular river basin, as well as an analysis of such an event that occurred in July 1975 and affected large swaths of the geographic area we have taken into consideration. In order to identify the regions which are vulnerable to the processes caused by slope run-off we have used the Flash Flood Potential Transmission Index (FFPTI), first proposed and used by Smith (2003) in the “Western Region Flash Flood Project” (WRFFP) and then by several researchers from Romania, such as G. Minea (2011), M. Mătreață (2011) and M. Borcan (2011). The main purpose of this method is the estimation of an index that would synthetically express the flashflood potential for both a major river basin (such as Ialomita River Basin) as well as for a minor river basin (usually sub-components of major river basins). The quantification of the impact that the major physical-geographic factors (slope, soil texture and land use) and the main run-off causing factor, rainfall, have gives the magnitude of this flash-flood potential transmission index.
Key words: flash-flood potential transmission index, risk classes, Ialomita River Basin, July 1975 flash-flood and maximum rain-fall.