Check out SwimCast's Real Time Data Link at:
http://www.co.lake.il.us/health/ehs/SwimCastDataAP.asp
SwimCast, a predictive model in Lake County, Illinois, uses
meteorological equipment to monitor a beach's environment and
predicts when water quality standards may be exceeded.
Lake County, Illinois
The Lake County Health Department (LCHD) in northern Illinois is
validating and implementing predictive models to augment the beach
water quality monitoring at several Lake Michigan beaches. Because
health warnings are generally based on E. coli concentrations from
samples taken the previous day, predictive models based on
continuously measured hydro-meteorological variables are an excellent
alternative. In the summer of 2004, LCHD installed predictive
modeling equipment to predict E. coli levels at two Lake Michigan
beaches: Illinois Beach State Park-South Beach in Zion and Forest
Park Beach in Lake Forest.
The models used measures of wind speed/direction, sunlight, rainfall,
air/water temperature, humidity, wave height, dissolved solids,
clarity, and other variables. In the 2004 swimming season, they
accurately predicted whether E. coli concentrations would be above or
below the 235-cfu/100 ml threshold for full body contact 85% of the
time. Using the predictive models created in 2004 for the 2005
season, SwimCast was 89% accurate at Illinois State Park-South Beach
and 95% accurate at Forest Park Beach.
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