Background

The management of natural hazards tends radically to distribute responsibilities at the local level, as the first civil protection actors. Prevention and preparedness are long-term goals, rooted in volunteer expertise, and awareness of local citizens, using solutions of “crowd-sourced mappers”. The objective is designing mobile applications, sensors and dashboard for citizens and volunteers of civil protection, with pilot study cases selected for training, usability testing, and product quality. The first step focuses on the collection of data from local populations, improving the awareness as long-term aim. The second step focuses on data collection with rescue teams on the field during crisis. The third step aims to develop human-sensors networks based on geolocation towards sensor network, with open-source solutions.

Purpose

Customize mobile solutions, for support in emergencies in cases of natural hazards, through open-source technologies. Testing in case studies of landslides and floods.
– Human-sensors networks to thicken capture network data to support models.
– Crowdsourcing experience for rapid data acquisition, testing, training, and bug-fixing.
The activities are started by partner for testing (state of the art and the available data). In 2017 the structure of dashboard-mobile-sensors based on the final requirements in the case study will be started in the field of landslides / floods. A first test will be performed with the Consorzio di Bonifica Adige Euganeo (PD).

Methods

Software and architecture:

• Android App (Android 4.0+)
• PHP Webserver (PHP 5.3+)
• MySQL DB (MySQL 5.1+)
• Google Cloud Messaging (GCM)
• Sensors for human-sensors networks
• Geoserver/Mapserver