more research needed on concurrent usage of information systems during emergencies

Volunteers and Research?• Figure 1 depicts the virtual activation processes

Montgomery County, Maryland Community Emergency Response Team (MCCERT) follow

• Table 1 is a history of 17 MCCERT virtual activations, providing evidence there have and will continue to be opportunities for researchers to study information systems in real-time

Proposed Research Strategy• Perform research during an emergency (versus

simulated exercises or post-emergency)

• Develop pre-established partnership(s) with practitioner(s) reaching mutual understanding of minimal disruption to response and recovery efforts

• Form a “researcher activation process”

Potential Outcomes for Researchers

• Reveal underexplored, critical area of emergency management

• Acquire appreciation for and understanding of decision-making challenges with minimal, or too much, information

• Capture lessons learned and best practices for developing performance measures

• Ascertain undocumented awareness as to how decision-makers reach conclusions/take action

Potential Outcomes for Practitioners

• Research findings confirm the value of using multiple information systems and validate ground truth

Figure 1: Recommended Research Focus Area

Table 1: Virtual Activation History

References

ReferencesBlum, J., Kefalidou, G., Houghton, R., Flintham, M., Arunachalam, U., Goulden, M. (2014, May). Majority Report: Citizen Empowerment through

Collaborative Sensemaking, Proceedings of the 11th International ISCRAM Conference. University Park, Pennsylvania

Bunker, D., Ehnis, C., Seltsikas, P. and Levine, L. (2013, November). Crisis management and social media: Assuring effective information governance for long term social sustainability, Proceedings of the 13th Annual IEEE Conference on Technologies for Homeland Security HST. Waltham, MA.

Condon, S., and Robinson, J. (2014, May). Communication media use in emergency response management, Proceedings of the 11th International ISCRAM Conference. University Park, PA.

More Research Needed on Concurrent Usage of Information Systems during Emergencies

Operations Challenge• During a response,

communications through information systems can be disorganized and unclear requiring rapid sensemaking

MCCERT is a volunteer organization managed by the Montgomery County Fire & Rescue Service (http://montgomerycert.org/)

Research Challenge• Few empirical studies have

been carried out on practitioners and their usage of information systems to interact among themselves

stevepeterson2@gmail.com ● Montgomery County, MD CERT

Virtual Assistance

Date Details

SITREPs (14 time) 2013 to 2016Received situation reports from MCCERT members on impact of snow storms throughout county

SITREP June 23, 2015Received situation reports from MCCERT members on damage from severe thunderstorm throughout county

SM Monitoring March 6, 2013Monitored social media traffic associated to snow storm from within a physical Emergency Operations Center

Data Mining March 20-22, 2015Reviewed data for critical health & medical needs and hospital locations (Vanuatu cyclone)

Data Mining May 1-3, 2015Reviewed data for urgent needs, medical information, & operating field hospital locations (Nepal earthquake)