 My name is Joanna Samataki and I'm a researcher at the University of Greenwich but I also do a lot of research, especially in extreme events and flush floods. How is that different from other floods? Flush floods are just very extreme short-term flood events. So a usual flood event that we have, there are a lot of different types of flood events but a usual flood event by the definition is about a three-day event. A flush flood event is very short, like a six-hour event that happens. We have a lot of more other types of events like tidal flood here in London, sewer flood, surface water flood, there's a lot of different types. But flush floods are just the more kind of intense and very short in duration. And why does it need its own research? It has very specific characteristics that usually we don't research and we don't model as much. It will happen more often, they will be more intense. So we need a lot more research to actually understand because they are not usually measured, they are not usually observed on the field because they are so quick, no one expects them to happen. What indicators do we have that there's so much more water during flood times? I mean, just by seeing on the walls on the side, you can see a lot of the walls look green, which indicates that water gets very often up to that level. But actually that wall is quite an interesting one because you see that there are different types of bricks as it's being built and it represents all the different kind of flood acts. Usually what happens is a flood event happens and then an act is being put into place to increase the flood defences to protect. That's a living wall of proof that research on floods is necessary. But that is very different from your research on flash floods. What are the fundamental differences? So the fundamental differences are kind of how quick they happen. This is the main thing and how quickly the level rises. So we can have two types of events. We can have them from the river, so further somewhere upstream, a lot of rain comes and suddenly the river rises far too quickly and breaches its banks. But then sometimes it's just London is built, it's very impermeable surfaces, all concrete everywhere. So a lot of water can just suddenly come down and then there is nowhere for the water to infiltrate. So it creates a flush flood just on the inside, further away from the Thames. So it can be a combination of the two. What I find incredible about the research happening at Greenwich is the emphasis on collaboration. How are you collaborating in your research? This is a project in collaboration with the University of Bath. We have a two-year project running, which is a continuation of an older project that we were doing. And it's very strong. We've used Bath as a case study, which is smaller and more contained. It has a lot of historical information, but it builds a lot with the collaboration with other people and universities and sharing all that knowledge. And could your research go further beyond the UK? Yes, absolutely. The whole idea of the research is that some of those events, as I said, they're so sudden, so they're not measured. So what we find at the end of those events is not very engineering measurements, very round numbers that we like over a certain period of time, but rather a line on a wall or a documentary evidence on a newspaper, someone that has gone out and said, this is where the water reached. And something like that is what we can actually use for research. And that is very useful for developing countries, for example, because there is not all of that equipment. Here we have some gauges measuring from the 1800s. This is not available everywhere. It's almost like citizen science. Yes, pretty much. It's how you can use some citizen science, which has some uncertainty around it, but actually input it in more developed numerical models and more advanced techniques and how we can just incorporate it all together. Researching at Greenwich. What's it like? Our team in civil engineering is quite varied, so we do research on all different types of research from earthquake engineering to, you know, it is a civil engineering department, so at the end of the day. Mine does have an effect on how structures can withstand a flash flood as well, but it's also about the modeling itself, the kind of computational, where is water going to go? Because water will reach the location it's going to reach. We cannot really stop it. It will happen. So how can we actually protect the communities? So how far-reaching is your research? So mainly we're focused on the UK, just because we're based here, there is a lot of data available, but I have had a collaboration in Mallorca, in Spain, in Indonesia, just different types of data available. So we're just kind of looking at where the tide reaches, usually, all of the green area. Water reaches on a more kind of everyday level. The tide goes up and down twice per day, so we can use a lot of this. The columns over there. It is unbelievable to think we're standing here and the water can get to there. That is quite terrifying. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And could that happen with rainfall? With a combination, the Thames is a very large river, it's about 300 meters to the other side. So only rainfall, it would need quite a considerable amount. But just from climate change, the worst-case scenario is that the flow, the volume of water coming down the Thames will increase by about 50%. This would be a considerable five-meter difference in height. And in the event of a flood, what should people do based on your research? So the main thing is that the water will come through. And if you block the water, it will just be redirected somewhere else. We cannot really stop the water and the flood from happening. If you have moving water, your street becomes like a river and there is moving water. If it's the height of your ankle, it can actually trip you. So you can actually fall. It can take you down. If it's about hip kind of height, it can take a car down. So the flood is very, very strong. In terms of what to do, get to a height. Get to a height, turn off your electricity, your gas, take all the important information at the higher ground. There are ways to block your doorways and so on, so you can block some of the water out. Are there like markers all around London then? Yes, there are. Sometimes you just see like an FL, like flood level and a little line. Sometimes it has a date. There are some flood marks here, actually, close to the Greenwich campus from two different high tide flood events. Are you noticing them everywhere now? I can of them and I'm asking for them as well in case an event happened. The funnest one I've seen was in one of the locations we're doing research in Penceford and the water reached through one of the pubs and they actually haven't painted the wall, that actually the water. So it's dark, it's a different color, it's discolored completely to where the water reached because that's a way to show people that it was very deep water. And it's a reminder that honestly, this is a risk that could happen in a flash. Exactly.