Amatra InTouch

- Emergency Communication Lessons Learned from the Colorado Fires 8/16/12

Earlier this year, the Lower North Fork and Waldo Canyon fires raged through Colorado. The Waldo Canyon Fire currently holds the unhappy record of being the most destructive fire in state history, and it’s also the most expensive, with insurance claims already totaling more than $350 million.

Waldo Canyon Fire

Waldo Canyon Fire, June 2012 (photo by L.N. Batides)

Five people died during those fires, including at least one who had signed up to receive emergency communication from her community but never got a call. No system could have prevented the fires themselves, of course, but a more effective one could definitely have lessened the human impact of the disaster.

Let’s take a look at some of shortcomings in the realm of emergency notification:

Preregistration

Traditional systems, like the Jefferson County reverse 911 and El Paso/Teller County E911 service, require preregistration. Which means folks need to have heard about the service prior to the time of the calls going out. From a PR and outreach standpoint, the effort required just to get people to sign up for these systems is monumental. Historically, only 5 to 10 percent of residents sign up, and the systems don’t cover visitors and temporary residents at all.

Even when governments get residents’ contact information from phone companies and service providers, there’s no guarantee someone will end up in the database unless they add themselves.

 

The landline conundrum

Many of these systems also target only home phones. As of late 2011, 32 percent of homes had only mobile phones, and one in six homes received nearly all of their calls with a mobile phone even if there was a landline present.

These systems tap into often-outdated databases and actually reach far fewer households than intended — a typical success rate is about 50 percent, according to the Denver Post’s coverage of the Lower North Fork fire.

 

Outdated technology

Relying on traditional technologies can also be risky when infrastructure crumbles during times of disaster. Jammed phone lines and electricity outages are just a couple of the concerns around this.

Other systems currently in use employ outdated notification channels. The television audience has declined by half since 1965, and only 85 percent of the TV viewers watch today is live anyway — those emergency broadcasts won’t do much good a week later on a DVR recording! Radio broadcasting also is increasingly fragmented, and with streaming applications like Pandora and Spotify personalizing and globalizing music listening more than ever, radio is really falling by the wayside.

 

Timing

And finally, there’s the issue of time. In the situation of a slow-spreading wildfire, minutes may be enough to get a message out. But in the case of a gunman, terrorist threat or fast-moving storm, it’s seconds that count. Relying on messages spread by traditional land-line communications and other outmoded technologies just isn’t enough today.

 

In communities already attempting to notify the public through multiple channels, thus far it’s a piecemeal, fragmented approach at best. There’s more that can be done, and Amatra is working to bring the technology and resources to reach communities of all sizes in times of crisis — more quickly and more reliably.

In our next blog, we’ll talk about how social media and our new geographically based technology — which requires no signup — can greatly improve public safety communication.

- Introducing FEMA IPAWS/PLAN/CMAS program and how Amatra fits in. 7/11/12

FEMA IPAWS/PLAN/CMAS


Federal officials and the nation’s largest wireless providers announce Personal Localized Alerting Network (PLAN) that will send emergency alerts via text message to mobile phones.
Download Application:  Fema-IPAWS-Application.
For questions completing or submitting please email ipaws@amatra.com or call 317-536-9234.

Advantages of IPAWS

The following sub set of issues could be addressed as a result with Amatra’s partnership with FEMA when the need to communicate with large number of citizens.

Available schedule/timeline of the FEMA IPAWS program:

  • One June 15th FEMA will begin accepting applications from Public Safety Agencies to get access to the system.
  • Initially the system will allow interoperable communication between approved agencies.
  • During August 2011, the system will allow testing with the PLAN compliant protocols. Agencies can begin testing to make sure they can connect to the FEMA system with PLAN compliant messages (Amatra software will take care of this).
  • The fully operable PLAN/CMAS infrastructure should be available for citizens outreach by end of the year or early next.

How can Amatra help?

Where Amatra comes in context of the above video is the “origination” of messages. Public Safety personals would require system like Amatra to trigger/manage messages. Amatra has signed a MOU with FEMA and has completed integrating with their infrastructure. Validation of the Amatra System was completed in June 2 and we are awaiting final report. We are aiming to be the first to integrate with FEMA IPAWS system

It is advised that interested public safety organizations quickly sign up for access to the system and receive their credentials. It typically takes 1 week now but and as more entities sign up the process time could significantly increase.

Amatra can help with the paper work and answer any questions you have.
FEMA

- Growing Link Between Social Media and Emergency Information 7/5/12

A recent study by the Red Cross revealed some important information about the future of emergency communication and mass notification. In addition to confirming the tremendous growth of social media sites and social networking tools (84% of respondents use social media at least once a week), the study also found that citizens are ready to start using these sites to keep updated with emergencies and important information about the communities around them. More than half of the survey’s participants indicated they would sign up for emails, texts alerts, or web applications to keep them notified of emergency situations. From evacuation routes to road closures, a generation or web-savvy citizens are looking to keep instantly updated with the information they need to stay safe and secure.

As it turns out, these new communication preferences don’t just go one way. The Red Cross also discovered that 69% of survey respondents expected city governments and emergency responders to be monitoring social media sites like Facebook and Twitter in times of trouble to find those in need of help. Nearly three quarters of these individuals expected help to arrive within half an hour of their online request for help. Clearly, the public’s expectations are moving toward new ways for officials and aid organizations to communicate and collaborate with them, and local governments must respond to meet these expectations.

Gail McGovern, president and CEO of the American Red Cross, says the report reveals important findings that shouldn’t be taken lightly. “The social web is creating a fundamental shift in disaster response,” she says, “one that will ask emergency managers, government agencies and aid organizations to mix time-honored expertise with real-time input from the public. We need to work together to better respond to that shift.”

At Amatra, the Red Cross’s findings confirm the concepts that we’ve built our business and state-of-the-art Amatra SmartSource™ platform around. Creating an effective and efficient relationship between a local government and its citizens hinges on effective and efficient communication. As the public moves to new methods of preferred communication, governments must similarly adapt. In the next few weeks, we’ll be talking more about groundbreaking applications of social media for governmental and emergency response agencies. We’ll also discuss how the Amatra SmartSource™ platform can manage, control, and track a plethora of communication channels to ensure that when every second matters, everyone gets the message.

To see the complete results of the Red Cross Social Media in Disasters and Emergencies Study, click here.

For more information on the Amatra SmartSource™ platform, click here.

- The Future of Mass Notification…and Where Amatra Comes In 3/1/12

In our last article, we talked about the growing trend for local governments and emergency response teams to communicate with their citizens through social media tools. Using these new mediums of communication coincides with the public’s increasing expectations to be reached through channels such as text messages and social networking websites. The Red Cross’ findings affirmed need for the Amatra SmartSource™ platform, an all-in-one tool that puts important information in the hands of those who need it, exactly when they need it.

Traditionally, the process of mass notification in the event of emergency situations has consisted of broadcasting messages over television and radio, hoping that a large enough audience will be reached to effectively manage the crisis. With our SmartSource platform, however, mass notification isn’t left up to chance. Whether it’s reaching volunteer fire fighters through text messages, an entire neighborhood through immediate phone calls, or even a school of students through Facebook and Twitter, SmartSource reaches each individual in the fastest, most effective way.

In moments of crisis, it is essential that the planning stage of mass notification is already taken care of. Amatra SmartSource™ implements a plethora of innovative tools to make this planning process safe, secure, and thorough. First, the platform lets emergency management officials create pre-defined notification groups such as law enforcement or local school administration so they aren’t left scrambling to discern who needs information when an emergency arises. Second, pre-defined message templates make certain that complete messages are ready for distribution in an instant. Lastly, geographically-targeted notifications eliminate time wasted checking if an entire area has been reached through traditional communications by contacting its inhabitants through multiple channels.

Local governments are starting to understand what businesses have known for years: catering your message to the communication preferences of your audience dramatically alters the way it is received. As the number of communication channels increases, the all-in-one solution found with Amatra SmartSource™ has the power to transform these local governments into safe, secure environments through safe, secure communication.

- The message and the audience doesn’t change, the way we communicate has. How are you keeping up with this change? 2/9/12

Remember when phones had cords? If you ask the incoming collegiate class of 2014, the answer will be a resounding “no.” A recent report by Beloit College revealed a number of characteristics of this young adult generation’s mindset and many of the most startling findings related to the way they communicate and connect with the world around them.

It’s no surprise that corded phones and snail mail are lost relics to the class of 2014, but the study found another interesting communication trend: email is outdated. Less than two decades after beginning its rapid rise in mainstream popularity, email is already seen by the new generation as too slow and cumbersome. Social networking sites and text messages have moved in as the preferred method of reaching out and hooking up, providing a quicker, more streamlined method of communicating.

For businesses, this young generation represents an outstanding potential market, but their ever-changing communication preferences pose the daunting challenge of how best to reach them. Amatra SmartSource™ takes the dilemma out of your hands by equipping you with a platform that can adopt and adapt to the evolving landscape of communication technology. Connect through email, text, and social networking today. When something new comes along, don’t change your entire communication strategy to try to keep up. Let SmartSource™ take your existing strategies and adapt to new technology on the fly, so that you’re always a leader in reaching your audience, not a follower.

Your business is concerned with crafting the perfect message and finding the exact audience that needs to hear it. At Amatra, we’re passionate about how you send that message. Expending time and money to purchase new tools and retrain employees every time technology reshapes your audience will leave you scattered, spending, and slow to change. Through every communication channel and with every new technology, Amatra SmartSource™ will connect you to customers in a clear, consistent way.

The message and the audience doesn’t change, the way we communicate has. How are you keeping up with this change?

To see the complete results of the Beloit College Mindset List for the Class of 2014, click here.

To learn more about the evolving communication solutions of Amatra SmartSource, click here.

- Community Based Mass Communication 8/5/10

When you think about a community, the most symbolic image that keeps coming to mind is a web. Dozens of unique strands—each anchored at different points and pulling in different directions—combine to form a solid web that is infinitely stronger than any single strand.

At Amatra, we recognize the diversity of every community and utilize that diversity to make our Amatra SmartSource™ Multi Channel Communication Platform technology as powerful and effective as possible. When a community adopts SmartSource™ for its mass notification and emergency management needs, it isn’t just City Hall or the local hospital that gain access to SmartSource™’s revolutionary technology. The numerous individuals and organizations invested in the public safety of a community each have their own niche to communicate with and serve. Each of these stakeholders is empowered and enabled with Amatra SmartSource™ technology.

Within the SmartSource™ database, governmental agencies, schools, hospitals, community organizations, and more can each manage independent contact lists. Not only does this result in organized and effective communication management for each entity, but allows for instant exchange of these contact lists in situations where every second counts. For example, in the event of a medical threat throughout the community, a hospital is able to quickly collaborate with city government to exchange communication information and inform every member of the community about the threat.

Without the centralized communication portal provided by Amatra SmartSource™, a community’s stakeholders have to work independently to encourage and promote public safety. At best, the organizations function like a slow-moving chain, where each entity receives information and informs their sector of community members individually. At worst, they act like dozens of strands pointing in dozens of different directions, each doing their best but losing all benefits of cohesive and unified communication.

Yes, a web represents strength and power. Amatra SmartSource™ is unlocking this power in communities and enabling them to communicate, inform, and protect like never before. To learn more about SmartSource™ and the benefits it can bring to your community, visit click here http://www.amatra.com/industries/government-industry/mass-notification.

Amatra Team

- The need for multiple communication methods. 3/25/10

Imagine a situation where the provider of your communication service has an outage which causes disruption in services for customers. For emergency notification this would have been unacceptable as critical information needs to be sent immediately.

That is why using multiple communication methods is highly recommended. Moreover sophisticated notification systems will have multiple providers for a particular communication medium. In case a service is down, the system can switch to secondary provider with minimum impact to customers.