CONTRIBUTION A LA CARTOGRAPHIE DU RISQUE D’INONDATION EN ALGERIE : CAS DE L’OUEST ALGERIEN

Abstract

Floods are among the major natural hazards in Algeria. They cause severe casualties, damage to the building and the destruction of roads, and infrastructures. The western Algeria is a vulnerable environment to flooding, it has experienced devastating floods in the past which caused considerable damage such those of: Mohammadia 1881, Mostaganem 1927 and El Asnam (Chlef) 1966. Analysis of floods is a major tool in flood hazard assessment in the prevention system. One of the objectives of this work is to do a detailed research on the floods which occurred in Algeria, particularly during historical times, and their effects in terms of loss of human life and socio-economic damage. An intensive data compilation has been carried out for a period that dates back two centuries. This inventory represents a step towards flood zonation and construction of an atlas of extreme floods in the western Algeria. The catalog of floods contains all the documented events that we have found. This work presents a method of compiling of events including historical ones and analysis of the obtained database. As results, this work represents an important contribution to floods risk mapping at the regional scale.