A student at Tel Aviv University working on his doctoral dissertation has discovered a method for accurately predicting the coming of flash floods long before they hit a populated area.

Noam David came up with the idea of monitoring the disruptions between cell phone towers caused by heavy rains. By measuring those disruptions, officials could potentially discover where a flash flood is forming, and warning communities in its path long before it arrives.

Researchers at Tel Aviv University's geophysics and planetary sciences department joined David in turning the discovery into an internationally-acclaimed breakthrough. This week, the American magazine "Popular Science" voted David's method the invention of the year in the field of safety and will feature it in an upcoming issue.