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People in emergency management can often be heard voicing their desire for better alerting systems or commenting on the slow procurement process involved in getting these systems up and running. The immediacy and importance of these needs can make it seem that change moves at a snail’s pace. However, let’s take a moment to look at how alerts and warnings used to go out.
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As readers will know, I have been a huge fan of social media when it is used as part of a plan in part of the toolbox (I most recently talked about it here). As a stand-alone tool, it has shown value and failure.
A 2009 study from Germany, titled A Measurement-driven Analysis of Information Propagation in the Flickr Social Network, traces messages as they “propagate” around the Internet.
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While vacationing with her family at the beach this summer, one of our AWARE editors experienced first-hand a prime situation in which alerts to mobile devices–like those that will be enabled by the Commercial Mobile Alert Service (CMAS)–will be critical. But with a goal of reaching as many members of the public as possible, the limitations of CMAS were equally as evident.
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Fairfax County, Virginia, recently released an analysis of how the County’s information was published and shared online during the preparation, response and recovery timeframe of Hurricane Irene. This report was released by Fairfax’s Office of Public Affairs, which, in keeping with the County’s Emergency Operations Plan, coordinates and disseminates all information related to major incidents.
The report details how users interacted with information on the Fairfax Emergency Information Blog, Facebook page, Twitter account, mobile app, and other online platforms.
Key findings included the following:
- Fairfax launched an emergency information blog during the hurricane which received over 50,000 views (more than any other county web page during the same time period).
- Fairfax County’s Facebook page received 335,000 post views and was the primary way people received information from the county on Hurricane Irene.
- The county’s website saw a 3,000% increase in the number of views to select emergency web pages during the preparation, response, and recovery for Hurricane Irene.
- There were 289 downloads of the county’s iPhone app during the preparation, response, and recovery for Hurricane Irene (up from 75 during a similar time period).
The full report is available here.
Image courtesy of Flickr user Haole Punk.
