A study of almost 70,000 tweets sent by people escaping the massive wildfire in western Canada last May suggests that smartphone emergency apps are not providing what people need to know. Software engineers at the University of Calgary studied the tweets to find out the most pressing needs and matched them with 26 apps they found for wildfires in North America and Australia.
“We found that up to 80 per cent of the features people are looking for aren’t accommodated right now,” says Maleknaz Nayebi, lead researcher and PhD candidate. She says this is a serious concern given the extent to which people turn to the internet as a primary source of information.
‘A more systematic approach’ needed, says professor
“What is needed really is a more systematic and analytical approach,” says Prof. Guenther Ruhe, who supervised the study. “There is basically an unlimited amount of information available these days from social media but also from open repositories and user forums.
“And we need to really learn more out of that and synthesizing this information to come up with actions that help in the context of emergencies, but not limited to emergencies.”
ListenTop ten needs not addressed
Researchers found that top ten things that would have helped evacuees were not on any of the apps they looked at. They were:
- Fire alarm notification.
- Food and water requests and resource.
- Emergency maintenance service.
- Send emergency text messages.
- Safety guidelines.
- Fire and safeness warning.
- Request ambulance at a tap.
- Find nearest gas station.
- Emergency zones maps.
- Find a medical centre.
The university is working with app developers to devise apps which are more likely to answer the needs of people in a crisis.
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