Google teaches AI to predict floods a week before they happen

Google has developed an artificial intelligence system that can predict floods seven days before they occur, the company announced. Developers are confident that their AI model can address this issue on a global scale.

The system was trained on historical data of past incidents, river level readings, terrain elevation, and other necessary information for forecasting. After completing the training process, the model was improved by conducting "several hundred thousand" flood simulations in various locations. Training on real data and simulations helped the system learn to make forecasts up to seven days in advance.

Google believes that the full-scale deployment of this AI system will help solve the problem of river flooding globally - on average, its forecasts are accurate for five days, but sometimes this period extends to seven.

To assist people who may be threatened by natural disasters, Google has integrated flood forecasts into its search engine, mapping service, and added them to Android notifications - more detailed information is available in the Flood Hub web application. In the future, the company plans to create a "global comprehensive flood forecasting platform."