Application of wireless tracer GPRS riverbed scour monitoring for disaster warning

River incision after long-term general scour due to the existence of river-crossing structures, always has a huge influence on riverbed stability and hydraulic structure safety. The severe short-term riverbed general scour, bridge and bend/levee scour, and scour downstream of a grade-control structure (GCS) occurs frequently, causing bridge failures, levee damages, and headcuttings during typhoon-induced floods in the intermittent rivers in Taiwan. For examples, bridge collapse and embankment damage events resulted in the loss of life and vehicles due to falling into rivers in 2008 and 2009. Now, the wireless tracer GPRS real-time scour monitoring technique has been developed to monitor bridge and general scour, bend and toe scour and scouring below GCSs in real time during high flows, with the approach trialled within a gravel-bed reach in the lower Dachia River during 2015. The result indicates that the proposed method has the potential to be used as a tool for the practical application of disaster warning for monitoring the safety of bridge and embankment