Integrating Ubicomp technology into Emergency Response

I have seen some papers presenting ideas of using information technology especially the ubicomp in the prcoess of an emergency response. It is really interesting.

The first paper, Secure Transmission of Pre-clinical Ultrasound Video Data at the Scene of a Mass Casualty Incident, presents e a portable ultra-sound device for a medical team. I think that the device can send an image back to the hospical through UMTS (3G) for further real-time analysis.

The second paper, Envisioning Collaboration at a Distance for the Evacuation of Walking Wounded , implements a prototype handeld for an emergency responder which can transfer information eg. images to an off-site team who is on a way or in the operation center. It  can help off-site  team to have a better understanding of the situation without bothering the onsite team which needs to focus on working. One interesting feature is that an emergency responser can tag a victim with a tag (probably RF-ID)  and add necessary information regarding the victim’s status on the tag. The response team could have an overall picture of the victims  through these distributed tags from the operation center.

The third paper, Designing for material practices of coordinating emergency teamwork, that I read is similar to the second one. They implement 3 prototypes. The first deivce is for the victim who can walk. The responder put the first device on the victim to guide him to a safe zone. The second device is a hanhled device like the first device, and it is used for the responder to give him or her an overview of the situation. The third device is the big screen in the operation center to gice an overview of the situation.

I really like the idea of using technology to improve the emergency process. Paper 4 ,Handy Navigation in Ever-Changing Spaces—an Ethnographic Study of Firefighting Practices, where it study about how ubicomp can be used  by firefighters to help navigating, gives a strong point that technology should be used for augmenting but not for replacing current practice (prabably including human inteligence too).

Level of disaster in Germany (MANV)

There are four levels of disasters in Germany.

Its classification is called MANV (Massenanfall von Verletzten).

Level 1 : Up to 50 people are affected. Local or nearby medical services can handle.

Level 2 : Between 50 to 500 people are affected. Assistances from other regions are needed.

Level 3: More than 500 people are affected.

Level 4. The infrasture is destroyed.

source : wiki and www.iscram.org/dmdocuments/ISCRAM2007/Proceedings/Pages_377_383_42ISEC_01_A_Secure.pdf

Flashover and Backdraft

Have you ever heard of the movie called “Backdraft” starred by Kurt Russel?

I have seen that movie since I was a child. I had no idea that the word “backdraft” has a special meaning.

Fire requires oxygen to burn. Backdraft occurs when there is no oxygen in the room. Combustion is stopped, but the combustible gas and smoke is remained. If the oxygen is introduced, the room could explode. One way to avoid is not to open the door to the starved oxygen room directly. I played the game “Fire Department 3,” and it suggests that we should break a small hall in the door instead of openning it. We don’t want to introduce large amount of air into the room suddenly.

I think that the flashover is similar to backdraft in term of there is fire exploding everywhere in the room.

Heat causes some material to emit flammable gasses. When the temperature is high enough, then these gasses exploded.

The Fire Department 3 game suggests that the firefighter should break the window to let the gas out. As shown in the picture, the firefighter breaks the window from inside the room. I was wondering whether the room would explode first before the firefighter has a chace to break the window.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flashover

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backdraft

Engineered wood product

http://www.usfa.dhs.gov/downloads/pdf/publications/ff_fat06.pdf

Engineer wood product is very popular currently. It is being used in residential areas. Engineered wood product is made from putting many different piece of wood together. Engineered wood product performs good under normal condition; however, it fails when there is a fire. There was a case of a firefighter died because the engineered wood product collapses, and the firefighters fell into the basement.

Cause of death of firefighters

http://www.usfa.dhs.gov/downloads/pdf/publications/ff_fat06.pdf

I just found out today that there are on average 100 firefighters dead every year (exclude 2001) in USA. In 2001, there are 344 firefighter deaths from the collapse of World Trade Center, so there are approximately 400 something deaths in 2001.

It’s quite sad that the number of death per year is quite high. Another important fact is that cause of death is not only from structure fire (fighting fire in the building). Causes of deaths include driving crash, helicopter crashes for fighting wild fire, training and heart attack after going home. Deaths could occur at the incident scenes or while going/returning from the incident scenes.

I hope that the emergent technology could help save more lives.

My master thesis’s purpose is to study. If it turns out well, the prospect supervisor would make it happen.

If a technology will be used, it must be well tested, and the firefighters must be trained to use it. One thing which I must bear in mind is that deaths could occur while in the training as well, and its cause includes a heart attack. I never imagine that there could be a death during training. Thus, new technology requires a training. Be careful, not to come up with a stressful training at the begining.