Computer game inspires development of disaster management app for California firefighters – East Bay Times

California has beat its personal file. In 2018, the Butte County “Camp Hearth” took first place on the High 10 checklist of the state’s deadliest and most harmful fires since 1932. Second place held agency with LA’s Griffith Park Hearth of 1933. But, California wildfires ignited this 12 months have taken first, third, fourth, and fifth locations, with Northern California’s August Complicated Hearth on the high, having surpassed one million acres, says Will Pigeon, assistant hearth captain for Contra Costa County Hearth Safety District.

“I’m listening to the reality of what former Vice President Al Gore mentioned in ‘An Inconvenient Reality,’ his 2006 documentary about international warming,” Pigeon mentioned. “He was proper when he correlated international warming with the dramatic and regular improve in wildfires.”

And, it’s solely gotten worse.

“Occasions have modified,” mentioned Pigeon, “and these megafires, extraordinary fires that devastate a big space, are the brand new regular. Whereas it’s devastating to the atmosphere and to the individuals who dwell there, it additionally has change into increasingly harmful for the firefighters combating these infernos.”

In 2013, 19 firefighters died preventing an Arizona hearth. In 2018, the Shasta County “Carr” hearth, attributable to a flat tire, which enabled the rim to ignite sparks alongside the highway, price a reported $1.6 billion in damages and the lives of three firefighters.

Contra Costa County Hearth Captain Andy Bozzo of Carmel felt these lives might need been saved, had their hearth departments been utilizing the iPad-based “Pill Command” incident navigation-and-response software program he and Pigeon invented, as a substitute of conventional whiteboards, paper, and pencils to observe fires, monitor hearth engines, and direct firefighters to security.

Inspiration for brand spanking new incident navigation

In 2007, Contra Costa County’s Captain Matthew C. Burton and Engineer Scott P. Desmond perished whereas preventing a home hearth, on account of a flashover, the place each flamable floor quickly and concurrently ignited. Within the aftermath, Bozzo and Pigeon questioned what sort of incident and tactical command program might need saved their comrades’ lives.

Some six years later, Bozzo was taking part in “Phrases with Associates” on his iPhone, a multiplayer sport by which members construct phrases, crossword-puzzle model, by dragging letters into place. That’s when it hit him; if he may drag letters, maybe he may create an app, accessible on an iPad, the place firefighters may handle an incident by tapping and dragging hearth models on a display, to trace fires, engines, and crew.

If he couldn’t do it, Will Pigeon may. Whereas working in hearth companies, Pigeon, who has a bachelor’s diploma in enterprise data techniques from San Diego State, additionally has labored in IT consulting. The 2 sat down with a beverage and started to map out “Pill Command” on a cocktail serviette.

“Our purpose was to create an incident navigation instrument that will assist to avoid wasting lives as hearth circumstances quickly deteriorate,” Bozzo mentioned. “When hearth crews have been working for a sure period of time, it’s like an hourglass. In the event you don’t make progress earlier than the sands run out, you’ve obtained issues.”

Which is why incident commanders have to preserve monitor of everybody’s task, how lengthy they’ve been out within the subject, and the placement and standing of the hearth, in real-time.

After working with a developer to construct their app, Bozzo and Pigeon introduced “Pill Command” amongst 18 rivals on the 2013 “Monterey Bay Regional Enterprise Plan Competitors,” and received.

Utility of the App

Whereas profitable the enterprise competitors was validating, it was the tragedy that impressed them to innovate, and a dedication to fireside security going ahead that prompted them to place it into apply.

In July 2018, firefighters in Marin County had been caught in an inferno when the hearth erupted right into a “hearth twister.”

Surrounded by hearth with no sense of the place to go, the firefighters assumed they had been performed, till their incident commander pulled up their location on Pill Command, studied the hearth and topography, and directed them to the one choice that will cause them to a security zone by a reservoir. Moments earlier than, that they had been about to make the fallacious choice.

When Bozzo introduced Pill Command to Van Riviere, battalion chief for Stockton Hearth, now retired, the self-proclaimed traditionalist thought it was a waste of time. Undaunted, Bozzo returned and labored a fireplace situation by way of his program for a roomful of deputy hearth chiefs. Riviere not solely was offered on the app; he turned CEO of the corporate.

“Our undertaking was born out of two line-of-duty deaths in Contra Costa County, the station we work out of,” Bozzo mentioned. “The wildfire floor is a dynamic and harmful atmosphere. If we don’t know the place it’s headed, we’re not on our sport. Figuring out who’s doing what, when and the place is important to protected incident command.”

Clearly, the best way to guard lives is to resolve the problems which are creating the circumstances which fire up megafires. The best way to avoid wasting lives, says Riviere, is to place know-how to make use of to create consciousness of what’s happening and perceive the place all sources are because the disaster unfolds.

“Whereas there are different answer suppliers in the marketplace with an incident administration instrument, all are dependent upon Web connectivity to work,” Riviere mentioned. “Pill Command was designed and created to face alone; it would run on a tool whether or not related to the Web or not. Hearth Districts are discovering this important.”

In contrast to others, says Bozzo, Pill Command was created by firefighters with huge expertise responding to and commanding incidents, by firefighters who know precisely what can occur in a disaster with out the good thing about this monitoring and knowledge instrument.

The primary buyer of Pill Command was the town of Stockton in 2013. Cal Hearth is utilizing Pill Command in numerous components of the state, together with San Bernardino County Hearth Division, Stockton Hearth Division, San Diego Hearth Division, San Francisco Hearth Division, Santa Clara County Hearth Division. As well as, many county businesses, which take part within the statewide wildfire response — San Mateo, Contra Costa, Marin, San Diego, San Joaquin, Ventura and San Francisco — have invested in Pill Command as their useful resource administration instrument.

Value, says Riviere, just isn’t prohibitive. Relying on the dimensions and performance of the company, Pill Command will price round $8,500 to $14,500 per 12 months. “A Home windows laptop prices $6,000, and an iPad Professional is $1,200. A transportable radio is $3,500 to $6,000. For that, you possibly can virtually have Pill Command.”

Monterey County just isn’t but utilizing

“I’ve checked out it, and it’s an excellent product,” mentioned Monterey Hearth Chief Gaudenz Panholzer, who leads a division that operates six hearth stations.“Whereas it might be a precious instrument, it’s cost-prohibitive for us, not by way of the product, however to combine it with our computer-aided dispatch system may price $20,000.”

Panholzer did look into sharing the price of implementation with the town of Salinas. Nevertheless, allocating already restricted sources throughout this unprecedented wildfire season, notably throughout a pandemic, he says, makes Pill Command cost-prohibitive at the moment.