EXE Po 2026: Drones, Satellites And Scientific Expertise Put To The Test In The National Flood Risk Exercise

Let us imagine heavy, persistent rainfall across much of the Po River basin. Water levels rise progressively along all the tributaries and the main river. Landslides, mudslides, disruptions to road networks, and widespread problems affect various areas across Piedmont, Lombardy, Emilia-Romagna, and Veneto. This is the scenario for EXE Po 2026, the national flood risk exercise taking place from 25 to 27 June and coordinated by the Italian Department of Civil Protection.

For three days, the civil protection system is putting its procedures, tools, and coordination capabilities to the test in one of Italy’s most complex contexts. The exercise involves institutions, operational units, local authorities, the research community, and centres of expertise, each of which is called upon to test, in the field, its ability to respond to an event affecting the entire Po River basin.

Among those involved is the UAS network of the Civil Protection Department’s Centres of Expertise, comprising Arpa Valle d’Aosta, the Centre for Civil Protection at the University of Florence, the National Research Council, the CIMA Foundation and the Eucentre Foundation, which is engaged in observation, surveying and technical-scientific support activities through the use of remotely piloted systems and Earth observation technologies.

The civil protection system’s UAS network is simulating a Po River flood scenario

During the exercise, each team within the UAS network operates in a coordinated manner, pooling complementary expertise and utilising different tools to gather information on the territory and support the development of a shared understanding of the scenario.

Exercises such as EXE Po 2026 provide opportunities for practical testing: not only of the tools and procedures, but also of the ability to operate effectively within a complex system, in coordination with other centres of expertise and with operational units on the ground. Deploying Eucentre’s drone fleet to a flood scenario on this scale allows us to gauge the extent to which our expertise is truly transferable beyond the context for which it was originally developed.

The activities are primarily based on drone surveys (optical, thermal, Lidar, and multispectral) to acquire and analyse geospatial data necessary to understand and manage the event, support operations centres, and test procedures to improve our understanding of simulated impacts and critical issues. Operational staff are directly engaged in the areas affected by the exercise, whilst specialist personnel support the coordination of activities at the headquarters of the Interregional Agency for the River Po (AIPo) in Parma.

Rapid assessment using drones is one of the capabilities that Eucentre has developed in the field of seismic risk, and which has proved equally effective in flood emergency situations. In a scenario such as that simulated by EXE Po 2026 – vast, dynamic, with critical issues spread across several regions – the ability to rapidly acquire geospatial data in real time and make it available to operations centres is a tangible contribution to the management of the event.

Alongside the use of remotely piloted systems, the exercise also provides an opportunity to test the integration of different information sources. In particular, the procedures for activating and utilising the satellite products requested by the regions involved are being tested, assessing the availability and operational usefulness of the data in the areas of interest and experimenting with their integration into information flows to support scenario monitoring and analysis activities.

“In a vast area such as that of the River Po, no single technology is sufficient on its own to capture the complexity of the event. The exercise offers us the opportunity to verify how observations collected just a few metres above the ground and data acquired from space can interact, helping to build a more comprehensive and dynamic picture of the situation. Linking drone surveys, satellite information, and operational requests from the field means putting into practice that process of knowledge integration which, during a real emergency, can help transform data into situational awareness and decision support,” commented Umberto Morra di Cella, UAV manager, and Luca Pulvirenti, satellite observation manager, at the CIMA Foundation.

Technology and collaboration to strengthen emergency response capabilities

EXE Po 2026 represents an important opportunity to test in the field how scientific expertise, technological innovation and operational capabilities can be integrated to support civil protection activities.

For the network of Centres of Excellence, the exercise provides an opportunity to test not only tools and procedures, but also collaboration between organisations with different and complementary areas of expertise. This joint effort helps to strengthen the National Civil Protection Service’s ability to gather timely information, improve understanding of scenarios and support decision-making processes in emergency situations.