Abstract
In a situation of an unexpected catastrophe, uncertainty and demand for information are constant. In such a disaster scenario, the CRISIS system arises as a tool to contribute to previous coordination, procedure validation, exercise execution, a good and frequent communication among organizations, and weakness and threat assessment for an appropriate risk management. It offers a wide variety of tools for online communication, consultation and collaboration that, up to this day, includes cartography, tasks, resources, news, forums, instant messaging and chat. As a complement, mathematical models for training and emergency management are being researched and developed. For Argentinean society, it is a necessity to switch from the current handcrafted, bureaucratic emergency management method to a decision-making management model. Previous coordination, exercise execution, a fluid communication among institutions, and threats and weaknesses assessment are required for a proper risk management. With that goal in mind, it is important to reduce confusion, avoid the duplication of efforts to fulfill the same tasks, and have access to a complete vision of the situation, generated from the data of all the organizations taking part. The CRISIS system is a secure web application, accessible to every node in a network formed by the organizations which have complementary responsibilities during prevention and response. It offers a wide variety of tools for online communication, consultation and collaboration that, up to this day, includes cartography, tasks, media (organization and resources), news, forums, instant messaging and chat. As a complement, mathematical models for training and emergency management are being researched and developed. Currently, there are toxicological and epidemiological emergency models available. The present paper analyses, from the perspectives related to risk management for emergencies and disasters, the strengths and weaknesses of the CRISIS system to be used for prevention, response and recoveries in the case of a catastrophe.
Highlights
Emergency and crisis situations demand an effective interaction among multiple organizations with very different cultures, under the pressure of dealing with an event in evolution
As a result of a comparative analysis with other tools used in emergency situations, it is observed that while the Sahana tool [7] allows public access to search and report missing people in a catastrophe, the CRISIS system provides access to the institutions involved in the risk and emergency management
We present historical cases that illustrate how the CRISIS system can be used in prevention, response and recoveries: Prevention: the system has been used in multiagency training exercises, where procedures were corroborated and mathematical models were used to evaluate the effect of different phenomena
Summary
Emergency and crisis situations demand an effective interaction among multiple organizations with very different cultures, under the pressure of dealing with an event in evolution. They demand the coordination for the usage of scarce material resources available, the management of consumables and goods donated by the general population for the people affected, and the organization of the actions to be carried out by the human resources available in response to the situation, with the highest synergy possible. Not knowing the evolution of a phenomenon and its potential impact on the population may cause undesirable situations such as an inappropriate use of resources (which is a concern in developing countries where resources are limited) and poor decision making, among others. This work is, based on the experience obtained from technical research made by the Departamento de Modelado y Manejo de Crisis del Instituto de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas para la Defensa, Ministerio de Defensa de la República Argentina, between 2003 and 2012
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