Hydrologic Monitoring
Program
The Miami Conservancy District
(MCD) maintains a Hydrologic
Monitoring Program in order to
continually evaluate the flood
protection system and provide
recorded hydrologic data for
public use. These networks
include a daily Observer
Precipitation network, a Stream-Gaging
network, and a Real-Time Data
network. MCD also records
additional data and statistics
during each high-water event in
which the dams store water.
MCD’s Observer Precipitation
network includes 47 daily
observers who record
precipitation amounts each
morning. Several of these
stations have been providing
data to MCD for 80 years or
more. These records are
available electronically from
1982 to present on the
Observer Precipitation
application.
In cooperative partnerships with
the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)
and the Ohio Emergency
Management Agency (OEMA),
MCD maintains a network of 22
automated stream gages and 21 additional
continuous and non-continuous
stream gages in the Great Miami
Watershed. The stream gages
provide critical data used for
monitoring the performance of
the MCD flood protection system, determining
the appropriate response by MCD
during high-water events,
forecasting peak river stages on
the Great Miami River, bridge
construction projects, and a
variety of scientific
investigations pertaining to
local water resources.
Eighteen of the automated stream
gages are equipped with tipping
bucket rain gages that transmit
real time precipitation data.
The network utilizes the
Automated Local Evaluation in
Real Time (ALERT) protocol to
transmit river stage,
precipitation and battery
voltage data. A website application
displays the data on the MCD
website. MCD also receives and
displays data from an additional
10 precipitation gages that are
maintained by OEMA.
All 22 of the automated
stream gages are also part of
the USGS national real-time
stream gaging network, and are
equipped for transmitting data
by both radio and satellite
telemetry. Data for these
stations is quality controlled
and displayed on the
USGS Real-Time Data website.
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