A Probabilistic Vehicle Overturning Module: Assessing the Risk of Disruption due to Vehicles Overturning on the UK Road Network during High Wind Events

A Vehicle Overturning (VOT) Module had been developed as part of a Hazard Impact Model under the auspices of the Natural Hazards Partnership, which is a collaboration between a number of UK agencies including the Cabinet Office. The aim is to produce early warnings for severe events that allow us to generate an overall picture of the risk to society based on probability and impact. The VOT Module uses the high resolution MOGREPS-UK ensemble to generate a probabilistic risk value for likely disruption to the road network based on wind gust speed and direction. This value is calculated every 2km along every major road and motorway in the UK. Vulnerability and exposure fields are included in the risk calculation and are unique to each road segment encompassing a number of road features including road orientation, number of lanes and volume of traffic. Output is a visualisation of the road network in ArcGIS with colour coded risk values to tie in with the UK National Severe Weather Warning Service (NSWWS) colours. This can be used in the Met Office operations centre to assist in NSWWS warnings given to the public. This module is only one of a number of wind related modules to be created for the Hazard Impact Model. The impact of wind on camping and caravanning and risk of damage to buildings due to wind is also being investigated.