Prepared By: Jonathan J. Gourley (NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory)
14 September 2012
For the purposes of usage and/or rights to access / share / archive / modify the US Flash Flood Observation Database the partners involved in the project have proposed a set of policies specifying user responsibilities of these data. Ideally, scientific investigations using the database will be carried out in close collaboration with the scientists who have been involved in the research, development, and creation of the database. However, there are likely to be instances in which the database developers are not involved in the research studies or uses of the database. Thus, we have defined the following list of unacceptable uses of the US Flash Flood Observation Database:
- Use of Flash Flood Database Without Acknowledgement: Users shall refer to the “US Flash Flood Observation Database” in name when using or presenting these data in any public or scientific forum including conferences, workshops, meetings, technical reports and publications. An appropriate reference to the database for publication and presentation purposes is:
Gourley, J. J., Y. Hong, Z. L. Flamig, A. Arthur, R. A. Clark, M. Calianno, I. Ruin, T. Ortel, M. E. Wieczorek, E. Clark, P.-E. Kirstetter, and W. F. Krajewski, 2013: A Unified Flash Flood Database over the US., Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 94, 799-805, doi: 10.1175/BAMS-D-12-00198.1.
When referring to the SHAVE experiment in general, the proper reference is:
Ortega, K.L., T.M. Smith, K.L. Manross, K.A. Scharfenberg, A. Witt, A.G. Kolodziej, and J.J. Gourley, 2009: The severe hazards analysis and verification experiment. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 90, 1519-1530, doi: 10.1175/2009BAMS2815.1
When referring to the flash flood dataset collected during the SHAVE experiment, the proper reference is:
Gourley, J. J., J. M. Erlingis, T. M. Smith, K. L. Ortega, and Y. Hong, 2010: Remote collection and analysis of witness reports on flash floods. J. Hydrol., 394, 53-62, doi: 10.1016/j.jhydrol.2010.05.042
- Duplicating Analysis Methods in Order to Mimic the Dataset: No datasets, or portions therein, shall be extracted and cast as a new or different dataset without proper acknowledgement.
- Excessive Revealing of Errors (related to this dataset) Without Communicating Findings to the Developers: Collaborators / Users are encouraged to communicate discovery of errors or other limitations of the Flash Flood Observation Database as means to constructively improve future database efforts.
- Sharing these Data with Users Outside of the Intended Audience and Purpose: The Flash Flood Observation Database, or components therein, may not be shared with other users, even within the same institute or group, without obtaining permission from at least one of the co-authors listed in the database description manuscript.
- Holding the database developers liable for decisions, legal actions, damages, or conclusions stemming from the use of the database: The Flash Flood Observation Database is being provided in-kind for the advance of science, and the scientists who developed it may not be held liable for damages, actions, or decisions made in the provision of the data.