Emergency management software is the software used by local, state and federal emergency management personnel to deal with a wide range of
disaster
A disaster is a serious problem occurring over a short or long period of time that causes widespread human, material, economic or environmental loss which exceeds the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources ...
s (including
natural
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are ...
or
human-made hazards) and can take many forms. For example, training software such as simulators are often used to help prepare
first responders
A first responder is a person with specialized training who is among the first to arrive and provide assistance or incident resolution at the scene of an emergency, such as an accident, disaster, medical emergency, structure fire, crime, or terr ...
, word processors can keep form templates handy for printing and analytical software can be used to perform post-hoc examinations of the data captured during an incident. All of these systems are interrelated, as the results of an after-incident analysis can then be used to program training software to better prepare for a similar situation in the future. Crisis Information Management Software (CIMS) is the software found in
emergency management operation centers (EOC) that supports the management of crisis information and the corresponding response by public safety agencies.
History
Although such software had existed prior to
9/11, after 2001 there was a significant increase in focus on emergency management. A 2001 study by the
National Institute of Justice (NIJ) compared software features from 10 vendors. In 2004, the Institute for Security Technology Studies published a report addressing the interoperability of different software, which has remained a strong focus in the development of software for the Emergency Management field. To support National Incident Management System implementation, the
Department of Homeland Security
The United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is the U.S. federal executive department responsible for public security, roughly comparable to the interior or home ministries of other countries. Its stated missions involve anti-terr ...
established the National Incident Management System Support Center (NIMS SC) and the Supporting Technology Evaluation Program (STEP) in 2005. In 2007 a study similar to the National Institute of Justice report was conducted by the
United States Air Force
The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Aerial warfare, air military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part ...
(USAF). In 2008 the United States Air Force and the
University of Colorado
The University of Colorado (CU) is a system of public universities in Colorado. It consists of four institutions: University of Colorado Boulder, University of Colorado Colorado Springs, University of Colorado Denver, and the University o ...
Center for Homeland Security surveyed several hundred Emergency Management personnel seeking to prioritize user requirements.
Characteristics
Common features of the software include
Geographic Information Systems (GIS), weather and
plume modeling,
resource management
In organizational studies, resource management is the efficient and effective development of an organization's resources when they are needed. Such resources may include the financial resources, inventory, human skills, production resources, or i ...
, and
Command, Control, and Communication
Command and control (abbr. C2) is a "set of organizational and technical attributes and processes ... hatemploys human, physical, and information resources to solve problems and accomplish missions" to achieve the goals of an organization or e ...
(C3) functions.
The
Federal Emergency Management Agency
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is an agency of the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS), initially created under President Jimmy Carter by Presidential Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1978 and implemented by two Ex ...
(FEMA) supports evaluation of software through the
National Incident Management System
The National Incident Management System (NIMS) is a standardized approach to incident management developed by the United States Department of Homeland Security. The program was established in March 2004, in response to Homeland Security Presidentia ...
Supporting Technology Evaluation Program (NIMS STEP). As of October 1, 2013 the FEMA P-TAC Center (formally the NIMSSC) is no longer taking applications for STEP. The National Preparedness Directorate Incident Management Systems Integration Division (NPD-IMSI) identifies criteria for this program to evaluate against. These criteria are derived primarily from the National Incident Management System. For example:
*Emergency Support Functions (ESFs) as per
National Response Framework
The United States National Response Framework (NRF) is part of the National Strategy for Homeland Security that presents the guiding principles enabling all levels of domestic response partners to prepare for and provide a unified national respons ...
(NRF) definition
*Incident Command Functions as per National Incident Management System
**Resource Management (preparedness, incident response, post-incident recovery, reimbursement)
*All-hazards philosophy as per the National Incident Management System
**Specific hazards identified as per
National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) 1600: Standard on Disaster /
Emergency Management and Business Continuity Programs
*Standardized framework /
Common Operating Picture as per National Incident Management System
*
Scalability
Scalability is the property of a system to handle a growing amount of work by adding resources to the system.
In an economic context, a scalable business model implies that a company can increase sales given increased resources. For example, a ...
as per National Incident Management System
*Command and Management –
Incident Command System
The Incident Command System (ICS) is a standardized approach to the command, control, and coordination of emergency response providing a common hierarchy within which responders from multiple agencies can be effective.
ICS was initially develo ...
(ICS) as per National Incident Management System
FEMA currently use
WebEOCas its emergency management software. And the Florida based big healthcare system AdventHealth use
ARC Facilitiesas their healthcare compliance software.
Interoperability
The primary focus of these standards is
interoperability
Interoperability is a characteristic of a product or system to work with other products or systems. While the term was initially defined for information technology or systems engineering services to allow for information exchange, a broader defi ...
. A lack of interoperability was identified as a key drawback (although not limited in scope to the software) in a National Institute of Justice feature comparison report conducted in 2001. In 2004, the Federal Emergency Management Agency created the National Incident Management System which addresses interoperability by providing standardized definitions for different software to utilize.
The National Incident Management System prescribes several required features that these systems must incorporate.
*
American National Standards Institute InterNational Committee for Information Technology Standards (ANSI INCITS) 398-2005: Information Technology – Common Biometric Exchange Formats Framework (
CBEFF)
*
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 1512-2006: Standard for Common Incident Management Message Sets for Use by Emergency Management Centers
*National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) 1221: Standard for Installation, Maintenance, and Use of Emergency Services Communications Systems
*
(OASIS)
Common Alerting Protocol
The Common Alerting Protocol (CAP) is an XML-based data format for exchanging public warnings and emergencies between alerting technologies. CAP allows a warning message to be consistently disseminated simultaneously over many warning systems to m ...
(CAP) v1.1
*Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS)
Emergency Data Exchange Language (EDXL) Distribution Element v1.0
Crisis and emergency modeling and simulation
Software simulation is mainly used in the preparedness phase of the emergency management process. Simulation can be performed both to analyze possible emergency scenarios, to evaluate recovery strategies and to train institutional or private operators in better facing a crisis. Simulations can deal with weather and climate forecasting, landslides, ash clouds propagation, earthquake impact, cyber attacks, people behavior, and critical infrastructures.
Precondition to simulation is modeling.
Furthermore, an increasing interest is in simulating socio-technical systems where the impact of an emergency (e.g., due to a natural disaster) should be considered on both infrastructures and population. For this purpose, a novel approach is to adopt domain-specific modeling techniques in order to support representation of a crisis scenario as an executable model.
[Truptil, Sébastien; Bénaben, Frédérick; Couget, Pierre; Lauras, Matthieu; Chapurlat, Vincent; and Pingaud, Hervé. (2008)]
"Interoperability of Information Systems in Crisis Management: Crisis Modeling and Metamodeling,"
Enterprise Interoperability III, Part VI, Pages 583-594. DOI: 10.1007/978-1-84800-221-0_46
See also
*
Emergency management
*
Emergency Communication System An emergency communication system (ECS) is any system (typically computer-based) that is organized for the primary purpose of supporting one-way and two-way communication of emergency information between both individuals and groups of individuals. ...
*
Emergency management information system An emergency management information system (EMIS) is a computer database for disaster response that provides graphical, real-time information to responders./ref>
EMIS and emergencies
Four phases of an emergency are Readiness, Risk Mitigation, Respo ...
(EMIS)
*
EDXL Sharp
References
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