New Zealand Hydrological Society Workshop 2020

Holding a major annual event for 120 people very close to a pandemic lockdown, proved to be a challenge for the organisers of the New Zealand Hydrological Society's annual technical workshop.

Leading up to the event there was not a lot of regulation the team could use to guide their arrangements, so they had to be on the ground in Tauranga.  

The first challenge was that their two international speakers could no longer attend the event in person and arrangements had to be made at the last minute to live stream their presentations.  Also, a number of domestic attendees were unable to make it due to travel bans.  

The team were aware that contact tracing could be important and so having an accurate record of all attendees was very important. 

During the event attendees were provided with an App so that they could stay in contact with one another and be informed of any arising matters immediately despite their location or time of day.

Post event the team contacted attendees multiple times and asked them to report any health and wellbeing concerns they had so that other attendees could be immediately informed of any risks that they may have been exposed to.  Thankfully there was none and no Covid-19 cases were recorded or transferred as a result of holding this educational and successful event! 

During the event the Achievement in Operational Hydrology was awarded to Marianne Watson.

Here is a link to our wrap-up YouTube video of the Gauging Regatta - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMtwcd6OQHg.