Police forces and first responders in Europe are constantly facing new challenges and threats, particularly in relation to extreme weather and terrorist attacks. Coping with these complex events requires more efficient collaboration across agencies, organizations and countries.
The European research project BRIDGE (Bridging resources and agencies in large-scale emergency management) contributes to this by developing technical and organizational solutions for improving emergency management in the EU Member States.
The solutions will provide technical support for multi-agency collaboration in large-scale emergency relief efforts, ensuring interoperability, harmonization and co-operation across all levels of emergency management.
Meeting the challenge
Rescue efforts depend first and foremost on the ability of large numbers of individuals to make difficult decisions rapidly — decisions that need to be communicated efficiently to others. Every aspect of technology development must therefore be based on the needs of the users of the systems involved.
Emergency responders currently have access to large amounts of information and communication options via a wide range of sensors, smartphones and networks. It's paradoxical that we seem unable to make use of all this when we need to. It's a problem that reduces the efficiency of major rescue operations.
Large-scale multidisciplinary rescue services are put into effect in much the same way as they were 20 years ago. This contrasts with other areas such as medicine, where new methods of treatment are constantly being developed, with important consequences for public health.
Research and development projects concerning emergency services are urgently needed, and the EU has met this challenge through the FP7 program by financing the BRIDGE project.
Over four years, ending in 2015, €18 million will have been committed to improving responders' ability to save lives and property when catastrophes strike. The project, which was launched in April 2011, is led by the Norwegian research organization SINTEF.
BRIDGE aims to develop technology for improving communication and co-ordination during emergency management, particularly focused on co-operation among different agencies and organizations, on both national and transnational levels.
In addition to technological research and development, the project has also examined how European laws, ethics and social aspects affect co-operation, management and use of technology during major disasters. In order to ensure that appropriate solutions emerge from the project, a large number of first responders have been involved in the development and validation.
System of systems
The core component of the BRIDGE system is a middleware (software that provides services to applications beyond those available from the operating system) that supports the flexible assembly of emergency response systems into a system of systems for agile emergency response.
Such systems include legacy systems such as health care or vehicle registration records, different sensors, camera systems, unmanned vehicles and several other data sources. To producers of emergency response systems, the BRIDGE middleware offers a consolidated set of software services organized in three layers that help the orchestration and communication between systems, and the management of data produced by the system during an incident's life-cycle.
Command, control and information
Another central component developed in BRIDGE is a command and control information system for use in emergency management, named Master. The Master system provides a map-based common operational picture, mechanisms for resource allocation, message communication, weather forecasts and access to predefined object plans.
The common operational picture gives a customizable map-based overview of the situation, showing real-time information retrieved from a number of other BRIDGE solutions and services. This includes information about incidents, response elements, risks, patients, response personnel and vehicles, relevant social media, video streams, expert advice, models and hospital availability information.
Users of Master can view, filter and add information in the common operational picture. Newly added information is automatically synchronized with all other running instances, allowing all users to keep an up-to-date view of the situation.
The resource allocation mechanisms allow users to assign personnel and vehicles to specific tasks and locations using drag and drop in the map-based view. The allocated resources are notified about the new task via a mobile application running on their mobile phones.
The system is intended to be distributed across all command chain levels in the organizations that take part in the response effort (strategic, tactical and operational levels). To support users on different levels, the tool has been tailored to run on a number of different devices, including desktop PCs, collaborative multi-touch tables, tablets and phones.