By: Kathryn Feingold; Matt Fleming, P.E.; and Andy Richter

The HEC Water Management Systems Division (WMS), along with support from staff in other divisions at HEC and across USACE, plays a critical role in helping districts plan, operate, and communicate water management decisions through the Hydrologic Engineering Center’s Corps Water Management Systems (CWMS)/Real‑Time Simulation (HEC‑RTS) platform. HEC is the material developer for the CWMS program and is responsible for: development of the CWMS software; oversight and coordination regarding local field office software development; and coordination and management of others contributing to system software and hardware requirements. HEC also plays a pivotal role in the design, development and implementation of the USACE Water Management Enterprise System (WMES). Over the past year, we invested significantly in technical support, training, and data infrastructure to ensure the field can rely on CWMS/HEC‑RTS for timely, actionable, and defensible decisions.

HEC supports real‑time modeling by maintaining and enhancing the broader Corps Water Management System toolset that USACE water managers depend on. The HEC CWMS data team supports roughly 26,000 locations where hydrologic data are collected, calculated, and stored, forming the backbone of the information that feeds CWMS/HEC‑RTS modeling and operations. Throughout the year, we delivered 4,924 contact hours to the field and closed 444 support tickets, providing day‑to‑day troubleshooting on model configuration, scripting, data ingestion, and system performance. These direct interactions kept real‑time forecasting and reservoir operations running smoothly during both routine and high‑risk operations.

Software reliability is fundamental for real‑time decision support. Over the past year we fixed 161 bugs across CWMS/HEC-RTS and associated tools and logged 3,400 testing hours. Many of these efforts directly benefit HEC‑RTS users by improving model stability, data handling, and runtime efficiency. We also devoted substantial effort to documentation and training: 60 new trainings, tutorials, and guides were created, alongside 76 PROSPECT videos and the premiere of the new HEC Water Management YouTube channel. These materials and resources help field offices build and maintain local CWMS/HEC‑RTS configurations, train new staff, and refresh skills before the flood season. In addition, 81 working sessions and workshops gave districts hands‑on support in developing real‑time model alternatives, scripting workflows, and integrating local data systems.

Major software releases this year further strengthened CWMS/HEC‑RTS capabilities. CWMS 3.5 and CWMS‑Vue 4.0 were delivered to the field, offering improved interfaces and workflows for setting up, running, and interpreting real‑time simulations. We also pursued significant improvements to the HEC‑RTS User Manual, adding new example applications in documentation and tutorials and producing new training videos, thereby making it easier for districts to adopt more advanced features throughout the software.

Reliable data infrastructure is also important. We advanced key data services, OpenDCS, the Corps Data API (CDA), CWMS Database, Cumulus, Airflow, and CWMS‑Python, and transitioned them to the CWBI Cloud environment. This move enhances security, scalability, and availability for the data streams that CWMS/HEC‑RTS consumes. The number of products hosted on Cumulus increased to 73, broadening the catalog of real‑time and historical datasets that can be pulled into HEC‑RTS for more robust forecast simulations.

These investments in software, data infrastructure, training, and direct field support position CWMS/HEC RTS (and the districts that rely on it) to respond with greater speed, confidence, and consistency when conditions change. We will continue working closely with districts in FY26 and beyond to refine tools, expand resources, and modernize services so that real time water management decisions remain well-informed, defensible, and resilient in the face of evolving challenges.

More information about accomplishments for the FY25 CWMS and WMES programs can be found in the CWMS WMES End of Year Report: https://www.hec.usace.army.mil/confluence/cweyr/fy25/cwms-wmes-end-of-year-report-156797872.html. The following figure, CWMS Value Added Infographic, summarizes key accomplishments.