Context Introduction » History » Version 4

COSTANTINI, Martial, 03/23/2016 07:48 AM

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h1. Context  Introduction
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Emergency response is a challenging situation that contains a lot of problems arising in a matter of hours after the disaster. 
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Few of those challenges are:
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* Situation assessment, evaluate current disaster scope and identify the most urging matters.
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* search and rescue (plus medical care following this rescue)
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* Emergency sheltering
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* Food and water supplies
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* Operation coordination
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All of those problems must be solved using changing and partial information, rapidly changing priorities and stressed peoples.
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In a nutshell, every emergency situation is unique, random and complex. The solution to this is standardisation of operation management.
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Coordinating those operations needs reliable communication means. Hopelessly, usual communication means are very often everything but reliable in the hours following the disaster.
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For instance, local phone network cells may be offline or saturated.
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The response to the possible unavailability of all those communication means is flexibility. It is desirable to be able to set up an outpost in most situations,
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if not internet connexion is available, the outpost should be able to function in degraded mode. If internet is available, we should make use of it regardless of its nature (either
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a satellite access, a wifi hotspot or a wired connection.)
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Those outposts should be as much as possible connected to an information backbone, in order to provide the best situation awareness to the personnel, plus improve overall response effectiveness.
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In order to get a good system, we might want to meet the following requirements (non-exhaustive list):
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* Ease of use, even in difficult context (gloves, only one hand, low light, little space, etc.)
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* Scalable
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* quick deployment
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* Form factor consistent with equipment capabilities
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* Rugged design (IP68-like stresses like water, dust, shocks, etc.)
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* Reliable
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* Remains operational if no connexion to the information backbone
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* low price
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* Flexible yet standard power supply options
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* Versatile
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* Secure ( confidentiality of the information backbone must not be put at risk)
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To answer this is quite a quite a challenge, because some of those requirements are more or less contradictory (security VS quick deployment, versatility VS reliability, etc.)
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Our answer will take the form of an ECCS: Emergency Communication Cell by Satellite. It will be a device (here a rugged suitcase) that can deploy a small area of telecommunication services.
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This box can be connected to the internet (either satellite or landline, provided we have the usual RJ45/MAC/IP compatibility) or operate completely on its own, running operation specific software to serve the operational needs.
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It is a device taking part in the *box family, composed of Maxibox and Minibox. As we are making it even smaller than minibox, we call it microbox.