Estimating flood exposure potentials in Turkish catchments through index-based flood mapping

Flooding is widely believed to be the most common natural disaster in Europe, and the changing climatic conditions are estimated to increase its adverse impacts. Effective flood strategies require thorough consideration of the factors underlying the flood generation mechanism and a widened display of mitigation priorities for spatially exhaustive assessments. Flood potential maps generated herein for indicating potential flood areas prove to be among powerful tools for comprehensive flood assessments. In the presented study, a countrywide characterization is achieved in this context by analyzing catchment units, which constitute the river basin systems in Turkey, through a series of spatial indices adapted from different factors effective in flood generation. The study aims to contribute to depicting priorities for in-depth flood assessments and to the re-orientation of subsequent control measures. The flood potential maps obtained for river catchments and designating individual locations with comparably higher flood potentials are expected to set light to the selection of case studies for local flood research in Turkey while contributing to decision making and policy implementation on flood control at the macroscale.