Protecting citizens includes providing appropriate, timely, and accurate communications. In the event of an emergency they must, in fact, receive information on what is happening, where it is happening, and how to behave.
Emergency workers must also be notified in real-time, according to management needs. Multichannel, Response Certification, Escalation are the characteristics of our service.
Beta 80’s alert solutions involve the use of various apps and notification systems. Among these, the Intelligent Notification System – “Clever Notify”, a tool to alert the different parties involved in the emergency through traditional channels (e-mail, SMS, push notification) and social (Telegram, Twitter, Facebook).
Communications can be used to summon, alert or engage people and resources. The notification is smart because it is able to intercept the response and, depending on it, activate escalation processes.
Dedicated to the field personnel, Beta 80 developed Safety 1st ACT, the iOS app to communicate between the territory and the Emergency Operation Centers. ACT provides a real-time overview of what is happening, lets users receive messages from the EOC or make structured reports:
Among the main features:
situation framework consultation
Sending of reports
Sending the position on request to the Operations Room.
Safety 1st ALERT is dedicated to citizens being informed of current alerts, planned events and behaviors to be followed in the event of an emergency. ALERT is distributed free of charge, while communication with the EOC is guaranteed by the Safety 1st system. Among the main functions, we find:
consultation of alerts and events in progress
sending of emergency communications via push notification
consultation of the behaviors to be followed and of the summary elements of the emergency plan
Early warning is important: correcting alerting people before an event has had devastating effects can be the difference between life and death. If with Tsunamis, the Early Warning System is now consolidated (thanks to the fact that the source is very distant from the coasts), for other phenomena it is more complex. Just think of an earthquake: in this case, the damage is usually very close to the epicenter.
Beta 80 Group partners with institutions and universities for research projects on this topic: we are now involved in the Turnkey project, funded under the European Horizon 2020 program. The goal is not only to notify citizens and rescue workers of the arrival of an earthquake but also to provide an immediate situational picture to the Emergency Operation Center, so that damage or losses can be estimated the real inspections, thus reducing response times.
Another front of the investigation is the use of Artificial Intelligence by using smartphones on the ground as a “smart sensor”. This is what we have done with the E-CITIJENS project: Twitter messages are collected, reprocessed based on metrics, and linked to other results (from thermal cameras, thermometers).
Our goal is to ensure that the EOC is not only reactive but proactive, anticipating critical issues.