On-demand Webinar

View Important Policies and System Requirements for this course.

This webinar was co-sponsored by ASCE's Environmental & Water Resources Institute (EWRI) and ASCE Continuing Education

Instructor:  Jeff Harris, P.H.

Course Length: 1 Hour

This webinar provides an overview of the use of gridded radar rainfall in the HEC-HMS software.

Purpose and Background

The Hydrologic Modeling System (HMS) software is a product of the US Army Corps of Engineers' (USACE) Hydrologic Engineering Center (HEC), hence the name HEC-HMS. The latest version is 4.0 and is available directly from the HEC website. It is free of charge to download and use. The latest documentation is also available. The HEC-HMS software is written in general terms so it can be used on a variety of basins. Basins can be large, small, urban, commercial, industrial, wet, dry, etc. It handles channel routing, soil moisture wetting and drying, snowmelt, precipitation, baseflow, diversions, and reservoirs, among many others. Users have the choice to select methods suitable for solving their specific problem. HEC-HMS also has the capability to use gridded radar rainfall to further enhance the computations to take into account detailed rainfall information. This webinar discusses the general aspects of HEC-HMS, then provides details on how to incorporate gridded radar data into the HEC-HMS Meteorological model process.

Primary Discussion Topics

  • General HMS capabilities
  • Accessing gridded radar data
  • Saving radar data for use in HEC-HMS
  • Building the HEC-HMS Meteorological model using radar data
  • Running a computation

Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of this course, you will be able to:

  • Become generally familiar with the HEC-HMS software
  • Demonstrate how to download radar precipitation data
  • Incorporate the rainfall data into an HEC-HMS model
  • See what components are necessary for an HEC-HMS execution

Webinar Benefits

  • Learn about radar rainfall use in HEC-HMS without incurring expense of travel and lodging
  • Have a general understanding of the modeling process
  • Determine if more detailed training is required

Assessment of Learning Outcomes

Students' achievement of the learning outcomes will be assessed via a short post-assessment (true-false, multiple choice and fill in the blank questions).

Intended Audience

  • Anyone not familiar with HEC-HMS
  • Anyone not familiar with using gridded rainfall in HEC-HMS
  • Private Enterprise and Public Agency Engineers
  • Hydrologists
  • Planners

Webinar Outline

  • Introduction
  • HEC-HMS capability to model Hydrologic Cycle
  • Accessing gridded radar data from the Internet
  • Storage of data in HEC-DSS (Data Storage System)
  • Incorporation of gridded data into an HEC-HMS model
  • Running HEC-HMS
  • Viewing output

How to Earn your CEUs/PDHs and Receive Your Certificate of Completion

To receive your certificate of completion, you will need to complete a short on-line post-test and receive a passing score of 70% or higher within 1 year of purchasing the course.

How do I convert CEUs to PDHs?

1.0 CEU = 10 PDHs [Example: 0.1 CEU = 1 PDH]