Sahana Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness

“CAP on a Map” Regional Workshop

22 August 2016

Asian Institute of Technology Conference Center

Nuwan Waidyanatha

nuwan {at} sahanafoundation {dot} org

Kunming, China

Biplov Bhandari

biplov {at} ait {dot} asia

Bangkok, Thailand

http://eden.sahanafoundation.org/wiki/Event/2016/regional-workshop

Short Short Courses:

Sahana 170: Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness

Sahana 171: SAMBRO features and workflows

Sahana 270: Operationalizing SAMBRO

Sahana 272: SAMBRO alerting practices

Sahana 470: Evaluating a SAMBRO implementation

Overall Learning Objectives

At the end of this workshop, you will have an understanding and realize the opportunities of:

• cross-agency situational-awareness from an emergency management perspective
• capabilities a Messaging Broker offers in support of coordinating local, regional, national, and cross-border alerts
• steps taken to operationalize a CAP-enabled all-hazard all-media Publisher & Subscriber tool with a Common Operating Picture (SAMBRO)
• efficiency gains and incremental effectiveness that can be achieved in alerting / warning with SAMBRO
• techniques that can be applied to evaluate the implementation and operationalization of SAMBRO for the user’s context

Sahana 170:

Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness

Standards fostering situational-awareness

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA1jY8LJ8tM&index=2&list=PL23CB283949653EDC

Issues around individualized disparate systems

Number of Channels M = N(N-1)/2; O(N²)

Information Lost in relay and propagation

Redundant Data Collection / Sharing

Inconsistent Terminology

Manual Collation / Calculation

Delayed Situational-Awareness

N = 5; M = 10

N = 8; M = 28

N = 20; M = 45

Data standards, Information Communication Technology, and Situational-Awareness has proven to overcome these challenges

What is Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness?

“Cross-Agency Situational Awareness System is an information aggregation system that facilitates sharing situational awareness within the public safety community. Information shared relates to incidents and planned events. It includes public alerts, risks to responders, and community profiles.” - Canada’s Multi-Agency Situational-Awareness

Pillars of Situational-Awareness

Perception

Comprehension

Projection

What is happening?

Why do I care?

What do I do about it?

Effects of Situational-Awareness

1. Improves information sharing among first-responders (e.g. Common Alerting Picture)
2. Immediate collaboration in response and mitigation
3. Creates connected agencies for public safety
4. Manages resource more efficiently and cost effectively
5. Saving lives and Livelihoods

​

​

Situational-Awareness

Decision

Perform Actions

Perception

Comprehension

Projection

Scope of Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness “ALERTING”

functions

scope

architecture

keep it Simple

Alerting / Warning

(EDXL-CAP)

Incident Reporting

(EDXL-SITREP)

Risk Mapping

(GIS)

Resource Messaging

(EDXL-RM)

Scope of Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness “ALERTING”

function

scope

architecture

keep it Simple

Alerting / Warning

(EDXL-CAP)

Instructions: Forming Groups

Clique participants by interested event type

1. Join a group that best fits your area of interest
1. Approximately 5 people in each group
2. If there are more than 5, then form multiple groups of approximately 5
2. Assign Experienced Stewards to the groups to mentor and administer the groups (u: admin@example.com & p: sambro)
3. Designate members with the roles
• Observer - one person to observe, record, and report on the human computer interactions
• Subscribers - persons designated as first-responders subscribing to alerts
• Publishers - person(s) designated as message authors and approvers
4. Everyone join sahana-sambro@googlegroups.com
• mostly to facilitate sharing documents / content, if any)
• You may leave the group after the workshop or remain to receive future communiques

Evaluation Guidelines for the Observer

Keep notes to discuss

1. How useful is (why and why not):
1. CAP for alerting in your country
2. Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness for your country?
3. SAMBRO in achieving your goals, intents, and actions?
2. How easy was it for the user to (why and why not):
• configure, implement, and operationalize SAMBRO?
• operate SAMBRO for authoring and disseminating alerts?
3. What is the reality of adaptation in your country?
• strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats

Vertical and Horizontal Integration

National

Provincial/Regional

State/Regional

County/Town/Village

Land

Earthquake

Water

Heath

Firefighting

Meteorological

Traffic

Diplomatic

“Horizontal”

Inf. Sharing

“Vertical”

A variety of means to public

1

2

3

National Emergency Early Warning, Alerting, Situational-reporting , and resource messaging System

Instructions: Complexities and Last-Mile Communications

1. Each group,
1. Identify the multiple paths by
1. consider the risk information people need?
2. who is the source providing the information?
3. what technology channels are used to deliver the information?
2. Use the flip-chart sheet to, list, in a column, all the
• risk information that closed user groups and public need
• Information providers (i.e. sources)
• Technologies used to receive the information
3. Link the risk information, source providing information, with the technologies
2. Rank the technologies by the number of arcs incident on a particular technology

Information

Source

Technology

Hazard, recipients, and technologies

All authorities have various public and CUG alerting systems:

• Earthquakes/tsunami by e-mail, news wire, �Web sites, pagers, telephone calls ...
• Weather by newswire, fax, radio, television, �e-mail, SMS text on cell phones ...
• Fire, Security, Transportation by television, radio, sirens, police with bullhorns...

Current Alerting Practices in the Maldives

​

Alert Message from Maldives Meteorological Service ( MMS )

TVM

Hotline

​

VOM

Hotline

​

NDMC

Hotline

​

​

MPS

Hotline

​

LGA/NGO,s

SMS

​

MNDF

Hotline

​

Pass the message to the public via TV and radio

Pass the message to the concerned Authorities.

Take necessary action

Pass the message to the concerned sectors within their responsible organization

Weather advisories and warnings flow chart

Current Alerting Practices in Myanmar

Cyclone

Flood

Tsunami/

Earthquake

Satellite map

Observation Data

Satellite map

Observation Data

Information from Regional Tsunami Services Provider/ Seiscomp3/ Local Network

FAX/Ph/SSB

• President office
• Local Government
• Relief and Resettlement Dept.
• Ministry of Defense
• Fire Services Department
• Local DMH Office
• Ministry of Health
• Myanmar Red Cross Society
• NGO

Media

TV/Radio/FM

DMH

Current Practice in the Philippines

NDRRMC

OP Center

Reg- 1

Reg -2

Reg- 3

Reg 4A

Reg 4B

ARMM

CAR

NCR

provinces

FAX

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

cities/

municipalities

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

Barangays

(communities)

provinces

provinces

provinces

17 RDRRMO

provinces

provinces

81 PDRRMO

1490 C/MDRRMO

42,028 BDRRMO

provinces

FAX

FAX

FAX

SMS

Warning

Instructions: Disseminating Alerts Exercises

1. Discuss the alert dissemination methods practiced by your own countries and/organizations
1. From the National layers to the affecting communities
2. Regional local layers to the affecting communities
2. Use the flip-chart sheets to draw a network diagram of the dissemination practice
3. Count the number of nodes and links that it takes to disseminate an alert from the source to the sink

3

5

3

Summarizing the current alerting information flow

SAMBRO removes multi-layered messaging chains

• SAMBRO serves as a publisher and subscriber hub
• Alerting Authorities can interface with with SAMBRO through a CAP RSS feed, CAP API, or GUIs
• EOC can receive alerts and relay them to the communities or first-responders
• Red Cross (RC) Societies would receive alerts and would relay through their networks and systems
• Media would receive public alerts to relay them to the communities through their regional TV and Radio stations
• WMO, Google, FIA, Accuweather and other hubs can render / relay SAMBRO CAP feeds

Sahana 171:

SAMBRO Features and Workflows

Outline of the features

• Sahana - Introduction and Architecture
• Configuration - SAMBRO and Eden
• Users and Roles
• Implementation
• Event Types
• Warning Classifications
• Predefined Alerting Area
• CAP Template
• Subscription
• Self Subscription
• Admin forced Subscription
• Creating CAP Message
• Authoring and Approving Message
• Relaying Message
• Acknowledging Message Receipt
• Verifying Alert in Common Operating Picture
• Profile Page - Full CAP Message
• Dissemination

Sahana - Introduction

26

• Open Source platform for Disaster Management Platform.
• Helps organisations and communities prepare for and respond to disasters
• Can be rapidly customized to adapt to existing processes and integrate with existing systems
• Data is easy to share with flexible Import/Export options and flexible Access Control
• Deployed in over 25 countries
• Free to use: MIT License

Sahana - Architecture

27

SAMBRO Configuration

After installation edit the text files

​

• ~/web2py/application/eden/models/000_config.py

Settings used for this instance

(e.g. Passwords, Database)

​

# Change for different authority and organisations

# See http://alerting.worldweather.org/ for prefix and oid

# settings.cap.identifier_prefix = "PAGASA-DOST"

# settings.cap.identifier_oid = "2.49.0.0.608.0"

# settings.cap.identifier_suffix = "alert"

# Change this for the offset period in days that the alert will be effective for

# Expire Date = Effective Date + expire_offset

# Default is 2 days

#settings.cap.expire_offset = 2

​

NB Unique Identifier for the alert = prefix-oid-datetime(now)-alert_id-suffix

​

• After editing text files need to: compile

28

SAMBRO Configuration

Text files

​

• ../modules/templates/SAMBRO/config.py

Settings used for all instances with the same workflow

​

# Whether to tweet alerts?

settings.cap.post_to_twitter = True

​

# Whether to post alerts in facebook?

settings.cap.post_to_facebook = True

​

# SAMBRO supports acknowledgement workflow

settings.cap.use_ack = True

​

# Whether to display "Submit for Approval" Button

Settings.cap.authorisation = True

​

• After editing text files need to: compile

29

SAMBRO Configuration

30

Sahana Eden Configuration

Text files

• models/000_config.py
• Database settings (postgres, mysql, etc)
• Email settings - outbound server
• Country specific restriction for GIS
• Geoserver settings
• Google OAuth Settings etc.

Web based Configuration

• http://host.domain/eden/admin
• SMS Gateway(s)
• Email settings - inbound server
• Import RSS News Feeds
• Manage Users
• Browse Database
• Look at Scheduled Tasks: db.scheduler_task

31

Users and Roles

• Access Permissions – permission to Create, Read, Update, Delete, Publish, Approve, Review, Subscribe
• Users Roles in SAMBRO:
• Anonymous – Not Registered, Public Users
• Authenticated – Registered users
• Map Admin – GIS/MAP Administrator
• Alert Editor - Alert Message Editor
• Alert Approver – Message Approver + Alert Editor
• Admin - System Administrator / CAP Implementer
• Permissions are granted to roles.
• User gets permissions by assigning roles to them.

​

32

Roles

• For creating Users (http://host.domain/eden/admin/user/create)
• Then assign the desired roles to the user.
• Can assign more than one roles to the user.
• User is notified through email

33

Dropdown to select the desired roles

Click to assign the selected role

Click to select the role you want to remove for biplov@ait.asia

Click to remove the selected roles from biplov@ait.asia

1

1

2

2

Implementation

Event Types

• The SAMBRO implementation begins with creating the necessary event types.
• http://host.domain/eden/event/event_type/create
• Hover over ? Help on the side of each field to know more about

SAMBRO

34

Hover over to know more about the field

Implementation

Warning Classifications

• The next step in SAMBRO is to provide the warning classifications to the event types created.
• Warning classifications are the division of the event based on some kind of magnitude. For eg Philippines has five Tropical Cyclone Warning Signals (source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoons_in_the_Philippines#Tropical_Cyclone_Warning_Signals)
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/warning_priority/create
• The color coded warning priorities provide visual appeal to the alerts.

SAMBRO

35

Can directly enter the HEX value or select from color palette

After selecting required color, click this to keep the selection

Implementation

Predefined Alerting Area

• The predefined area can be used to select the area relating to event type while creating alert.
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/area/create
• Or from UI: Alerting -> PREDEFINED ALERT AREA(Create)

SAMBRO

36

Click to Create Predefined Alert Area

Click to add multiple Tags

Dropdown selection for Country to predefine area. This can be restricted to single country from configuration settings

Click to add Polygon. Double click to finish drawing Polygon

Click to add Circle

Implementation

CAP Template

• Now we can start to create the CAP Template that will be used to create the actual CAP alert message.
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/template/create
• Or from UI: Alerting -> TEMPLATES (Create)
• Create template for each event type created before

SAMBRO

37

Click to create template

Subscription

Self Subscription

• Click on the subscription to edit your subscriptions.

SAMBRO

38

Click to List Your Subscriptions

Subscription

39

Filter the Event Type for which you want to receive the notification

Filter the Warning Classification for Event Type which you want to receive the notification

Filter the Language you want to receive the notification for

Filter the medium you want to receive the notification in

All Your Subscriptions are listed here

Click to Open/Edit the subscription for Flood

Click to Create New Subscription

Subscription

Admin forced Subscription

• First Responders in the field who are bound to receive the alert can be forcely subscribed to receive the alert by Admin

40

Click to manage the subscription of the recipients

SAMBRO

41

Filter the Event Type for which you want recipients to receive the notification

Filter the Warning Classification for Event Type which you want recipients to receive the notification

Filter the Language you want recipients to receive the notification for

Filter the medium you want recipients to notify in

All Admin Based Subscriptions are listed here

Click to Open/Edit the subscription for Flood

Click to Add New Recipient to Admin Controlled Subscriptions list

Filter the First Responders you want to notify

Filter the Groups of First Responders you want to notify

Creating CAP Message

Alert Segment

• After setting up all the implementation, we can begin creating the CAP warning message with(out) based on the CAP Template.
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/alert/create
• Or from UI: Alerting -> ALERTS (Create)
• Select the event type. The event type filters the template associated with it.
• Other information (alert, info, resource) are copied from template.
• Give the actual value where required.

SAMBRO

42

Click to create alert

Click to save the alert segment and copy the info segment from template

Creating CAP Message

Info Segment

• These info segments in different languages are created automatically based on the template.
• Open up the info segment and edit the actual description, instruction, headline, warning classification, urgency, severity, certainty etc.
• Once you update the warning classification, urgency, severity, certainty, effective, onset, expires, response type and category in one info segment, same applies automatically for all other info segments for that alert.

43

Click to edit the info segment

Creating CAP Message

Area Segment

• Area can be assigned from the predefined area as we discussed before
• Or new area can also be created
• The Predefined Areas tab is visible if there are any predefined area matching the event type.

44

Predefined Areas tab

Area tab to create new area not in Predefined Areas

After selecting the Predefined Areas, click here to assign the area to the alert

Click to select this area

Click to view the details of Tacloban

1

2

Creating CAP Message

Area Segment

• New area can also be created if there are no matching Predefined Areas
• Circle and Polygon can be drawn in the map view
• Or if a country has well maintained geocodes representing province/district/area, those can also be used with the Gecode.

[for example Philippines maintain a good geocode for each administrative units. More here: http://www.nscb.gov.ph/activestats/psgc/publications/NSCB_PSGC_Sep2012.pdf]

SAMBRO

45

Area can be drawn manually in this map view

Area tab to create new area not in Predefined Areas

Or can be specified using the geocodes.

Click to add Polygon. Double click to finish drawing Polygon

Click to add Circle

Creating CAP Message

Resource Segment

• Images and pdf can be uploaded in the Resource tab

SAMBRO

46

Click to add Image

Click to add any file like pdf or video and audio file

Authoring and Approving Message

Submitting for Approval

• Alert Editor sees the Submit for Approval button after creating alert.

47

Click to submit the alert to notify alert approver

Authoring and Approving Message

Authoring and Approving

• Email and SMS notifications are received by the Approvers

SAMBRO

48

Authoring and Approving Message

Authoring and Approving

• Approver must verify the content by clicking the Edit button.

​

• After verifying the content and certain that message is complete, click Approve; else Reject

​

• Only approved alerts are disseminated to the public or closed user group depending upon the Scope of the alert.

SAMBRO

Relaying Message

• External Message (alert coming from in alert hub) and,
• Internal Message (alert created by other organisation) can be relayed by the CAP Editor from different organisation.

​

• External alert are not disseminated to the subscribers unless those alert are relayed.

SAMBRO

50

This alert can be relayed because it is created by CAP Editor of different organisation. Click to relay the alert

Acknowledging Message Recipient

• The recipient of the alert receive a link to acknowledge the recipient of the message.

​

• The purpose is to make sure that first responders are aware of the event in their area.

SAMBRO

51

Use this link to acknowledge the recipient of the message

Verifying Alert in Common Operating Picture

SAMBRO

52

All the approved active internal alerts (alerts originating from SAMBRO system) are shown here

Various filtering options for the active alerts

RSS Feeds coming from external source are here

Color coded area segment

Map View that visualize all the active alerts at the moment

RSS Feeds for the SAMBRO alerts

Click to see Profile page for individual alert

Verifying Alert in Common Operating Picture

• Same View, Different Contents for Public and Closed User Group (CUG)

​

• Public – sees only public alerts, i.e. alert with scope Public

​

• CUG – all alerts

SAMBRO

53

Full CAP Message (Profile Page)

SAMBRO

54

Important Alerting Information at first

Detailed Information Segment

All maps and pdf are shown here

Color coded Map Area

Alert Qualifiers Element

Dissemination

Email and SMS

• Different messaging templates for email and SMS.

55

Dissemination

Twitter and Facebook

​

56

RSS/Atom Feed, FTP and GCM

• Anonymous (public) roles:
• Access public alerts
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/public.rss

​

​

• Authenticated users:
• Access all alerts
• http://host.domain/eden/cap/alert.rss

57

Sahana 270:

Operationalizing SAMBRO

User Guidelines

User guidelines: http://eden.sahanafoundation.org/wiki/UserGuidelines/SAMBRO

​

Organizations, Alerting Authorities, and OIDs

Add the Organization Name and CAP OID

To find your CAP OID: http://alerting.worldweather.org/

User Roles and Responsibilities

Functions and Technologies

Implemented

Planned

Subscriber

Publisher

Methods for subscribing

Subscribe to Event, Warning Priority, and Language specific Email & SMS alerts of choice

1

2

3

Twitter Feeds

4

Mobile App

Warning Classification

MALDIVES

Mapping for impact-based alerting

Using hazard, vulnerability, and exposure to identify risk (e.g., landslide prone area)

Define a risk-based predefined alert area to use when issuing heavy-rain and landslide warnings

Overlay with telecommunications signal coverage data to ensure warnings go through to intended recipients

High risk

Low risk

No risk

Predefined Alert Area Polygons

1. Risk Analysts define the severity (or intensity) specific alerting area polygons
2. Alerting Authorities then select the predefined alert area when issuing a warning

1

2

Predefined CAP Message Templates

Implementation steps

1. Create users and assign privileges
2. Define the following in the order
1. Event types
2. Warning classifications
3. Predefined alert area polygons
4. Message Templates
3. Subscribe to event and priority specific alerts (Admin / Self)
4. Conduct Silent-Tests
• Create and issue a msgType = “test”, scope = “private” alert to your group
• Check the CAP XML with Google CAP Validator: https://cap-validator.appspot.com/
• Check if alerts were received through all channels
• Check if Subscribers received and acknowledged the alerts
5. Ready to run controlled-exercises

Sahana 272:

Alerting Practices

Two Demo Servers

​

Server ONE: http://drmtl.geoinfo.ait.ac.th/eden/default/index

​

Server TWO: http://sambro.geoinfo.ait.ac.th/eden/default/index

Alert Cycle and State Transitions

Alert

Update

Clear

In our exercise we will ...

In our exercise - Alert --- Update --- Clear

Instructions: Issuing the first alert

1. Create a hypothetical scenario
1. Based on a previous experience
2. Complete story identifying all actors, locations, dates, times, and procedures
2. Create the alert
• Create a new alert
• Select the event type and template
• Set scope=restricted, msgType=exercise
• Submit for review
3. Verify and Approve alert
• Wait to receive SMS or Email
• Follow URL in SMS or Email to verify content and approve/reject

​

Instructions: Updating the alert

• Update the hypothetical scenario
• Upgrade the intensity of the hazard event (severity, certainty, and urgency)
• New times, locations, and area
• Update the previous alert
• Change status=”update”
• Warning Class (severity, certainty, urgency)
• Change the description and instructions
• Submit for review
• Verify and approve alert update
• Wait to receive SMS or Email
• Follow URL in SMS or Email to verify content and approve/reject

​

Instructions: Clearing the alert

• All-clear the alert
• Set the responseType=”All-Clear”
• Change description to indicate this is the final message for this event and hazard event has been declared to be all-clear.
• Indicate the instructions for all-clear (i.e. safe to return to the homes)
• Verify and approve alert
• Wait to receive SMS or Email
• Follow URL in SMS or Email to verify content and approve/reject

Sahana 470:

Evaluation methods

Principal evaluation components

• Usability
• UI/UX on system complexities
• Efficiency gains (i.e. relative to current practices)
• Quality (e.g. Validate: https://cap-validator.appspot.com/)
• Adaptability
• capabilities and capacities to alter to the change of the new system
• Utility, state of being
• useful
• beneficial
• cost-effective

Instructions: Discuss your experience

Keep notes to discuss

1. How useful is (why and why not):
1. CAP for alerting in your country
2. Cross-Agency Situational-Awareness for your country?
3. SAMBRO in achieving your goals, intents, and actions?
2. How easy was it for the user to (why and why not):
• configure, implement, and operationalize SAMBRO?
• operate SAMBRO for authoring and disseminating alerts?
3. What is the reality of adaptation in your country?
• strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats

THE END

Instructions: Defining Emergency Management Modules

• Each member in the group,
• Think about the information coordination (or communication) during emergencies and crises
• emergency and crisis management belongs to the disaster response and preparedness cycle with coordination among multiple agencies
• independently write down an emergency or a crisis management information need on a sticky note
• Example - maps of mobile cellular tower sites to determine cellular coverage
• Categorically cluster the sticky notes to identify the relevant Sahana modules
• Two groups combined, should place their sticky notes closest to a set of sticky notes to cluster similar information needs

Prevailing Issues

• Lack of coordination among agencies;
• Lack of a common knowledge and information systems;
• Lack of mass communication systems;
• Lack of protocols and standards for communications;
• Lack of hazard/risk maps;
• Limited efforts for capacity building;
• Lack of public awareness.

Evaluation Tool Kits

Objectively

• Human Computer Interaction (HCI) usability; i.e. UI/UX aspects
• Interaction techniques - were able to easily achieve their goals, intents, and actions?
• Operational efficiencies - were the users able to complete their processes within the warning horizon?
• Data quality - how well had the implementers readied the system with preliminary content? How complete were the messages issued by the users
• Human action cycle adaptability aspects