ECFAS Traineeships

ECFAS is committed to building capacity among the next generation of coastal scientists. For this reason, three traineeships were offered to early career researchers during the course of ECFAS. The traineeships were organised as exchanges of young experts between partners in the ECFAS consortium, with the aim of building the professional portfolios and experience of the trainees, and improving the flow of knowledge between project work packages.

Traineeship #1 saw  Maialen Irazoqui Apecechea join researchers from the University of Cádiz, in a traineeship facilitated by Consorzio Futuro in Ricerca. The internship addressed the characterization and evaluation of the propagation of uncertainties in marine forcing into flood model, focusing on the pre-defined test cases for extreme events. She also explored the differences in flooding obtained between marine forcing derived from operational forecast products and hindcast products, providing the first insights into the correspondence between forecasts and the hindcast-derived flood catalogue (contributing to ECFAS WP4 – Hindcast/forecast forcing of total water levels and identification of thresholds). Read more about the first ECFAS Traineeship here.

Traineeship #2 saw Marine Le Gal join researchers from Mercator Ocean International (MOI), in a traineeship facilitated by Consorzio Futuro in Ricerca (CFR). The internship was designed to intercompare different ocean numerical simulations with a various ranges of complexity (2D-barotropic vs 3D-baroclinic ocean models, different levels of ocean-wave coupling, tide-surge interactions etc) with a focus on sea level at the coast, including extremes. The traineeship contributed to ECFAS WP4, Task 4.4: Intercomparison of models, led by CFR and under the responsibility of UCA, and to deliverable D4.2: Report on the intercomparison between CMEMS and ANYEU-SSL modelling systems. Read more about the second ECFAS Traineeship here.

Traineeship #3 saw Paulo Cabrita join researchers from Collecte Localisation Satellites (CLS), in a traineeship facilitated by Consorzio Futuro in Ricerca (CFR), to develop an overview of the basis of altimeter measurements and processing. Paulo characterized the signature of different extreme events on different variables/parameters deduced from altimetry in terms of sea surface height, significant wave height, altimeter wind speed, using pre-processed altimeter measurements (validated and cross-calibrated) available in CLS databases. Comparison with in situ measurements, using the high frequency tide gauge measurement available on CMEMS and focusing on extreme events identified over the European coasts (e.g. extreme event identified for ECFAS project, eSurge database, etc.), led to an improvement of the methodology. Read more about the third Traineeship here.

You too can benefit from the expertise involved in ECFAS by taking part in the ECFAS End Users’ Workshop or by using the ECFAS E-Learning Modules.