Abstract: Modern safety-critical organizations are characterized by complex, nonlinear dynamics involving many interrelated actors and processes. Safety issues that emerge from these complex dynamics increasingly remain hidden, until an incident or even a serious accident occurs. Traditional safety analysis methods developed long ago for much simpler organizations cannot help identifying, explaining and predicting many safety-related properties of modern organizations. To address this issue, in the paper a formal approach is proposed to establish relations between local dynamics of actors of a complex safety-critical organization and global safetyrelated properties that emerge from these dynamics. In contrast to the traditional approaches, the organizational dynamics are specified by taking the agent perspective with an organizational layer. The application of the approach is illustrated by a simulation case study, in which spread of safety-critical information in an air navigation service provider is investigated. © 2012 ISCRAM.

Abstract: Disaster recovery operations rarely proceed smoothly and disruptions often require the redistribution of relief items. Such a redistribution has to be carried out taking into account both the current disruption and the uncertainty regarding possible future incidents in the respective area. As decisions have to be made fast in humanitarian operations, extensive optimization runs cannot be conducted in such a situation. Nevertheless, sensible decisions should be made to ensure an efficient redistribution, considering not only satisfaction of needs but also operational costs, as the budget is usually scarce in the recovery phase of a disaster. In this work, different scenarios are generated and then solved with a multiobjective optimization model to explore possible developments. By evaluating the results of these scenarios, decision rules are identified which can support the decision maker in the actual disaster situation in making fast, but nevertheless well-founded, decisions.

Abstract: Bushfire modelling has advanced with wildfire simulators such as Spark and Phoenix Rapidfire that can generate plausible fire dynamics and simulations that decision-makers can easily explore. With extreme weather impacting the Australian landscapes through the onset of droughts and heatwaves, it is becoming more important to make decisions rapidly from fire simulations. An element of this decision-making process is trust, in which the decision-maker feels empowered to make decisions from models of complex systems like fire. We propose a framework for decision-making that makes use of a fire emulator, a surrogate version of Spark, to facilitate faster exploration of wildfire predictions and their uncertainties under a changing climate. We discuss the advantages and next steps of an emulator model using the mechanisms and conditions framework, a powerful vocabulary and design framework that builds in trust to allow users of a technology to understand and accept the features of a system.

Abstract: This work in progress paper discusses analytically characterizing nonlinear recovery behavior through the context of the derecho windstorm that struck the mid-Atlantic United States in the summer of 2012. The focus is on the recovery efforts of the Appalachian Power Company, and the discussion includes a look at the need for communicating the progress of such recovery efforts to the public. Publicly available recovery data is analyzed and compared with respect to the relative behaviors exhibited by two different nonlinear recovery processes, and some of the implications for understanding the efficiency of different disaster recovery operations are discussed.

Abstract: The present paper introduces a high level modeling language, capable of expressing the concepts and processes of the Strategic Risk Assessment and Contingency Planning in Interconnected Transportation Networks (STAR-TRANS) framework. STAR-TRANS is a comprehensive transportation security risk assessment framework for assessing related risks that provides cohered contingency management procedures for interconnected, interdependent and heterogeneous transport networks. STAR-TRANS modeling Language (STML) is a domain specific language combining language simplicity with a very clear syntax, providing all the necessary elements (assets, threats, incidents, consequences etc.) to model the STAR-TRANS risk assessment framework. © 2012 ISCRAM.

Abstract: The relief organizations work in volatile environments involving a variety of actors with different skills and knowledge. The service of emergency for victims of natural disasters requires a rapid decision-making. The objective of the approach presented in this paper is to develop a Systemic Process Model (SPM) for procurement decisions in humanitarian logistics. The SPM aims to support procurement tasks of humanitarian organizations during the response phase in disaster relief. The approach provides a decision support tool using an appropriate quantitative model reflecting the specific area of humanitarian logistics processes.

Abstract: Epidemiological monitoring systems are used to control the evolution of disease spreading and to suggest action plans to prevent identified risks. In this domain, risk prediction is based on quantitative approaches that are hardly usable when data collection is not possible. In this paper, a qualitative approach based on an epidemiological monitoring ontology is proposed. We describe the design of this ontology and show how it fits into classical monitoring systems and helps overcoming limits related to quantitative approaches. © 2012 ISCRAM.

Abstract: This paper proposes a Cross Impact Analysis for supporting critical infrastructures risk analysis. This methodology contributes to decision-makers and planners with analytical tools for modeling complex situations. These features are generally useful in emergency management and particularly within the critical infrastructures scope, where complex scenarios for risk analysis and emergency plans design have to be analyzed. This paper will show by an example how CIA methodology can be applied for risks and identification analysis with an application to a Data Centre of a Critical Infrastructure.

Abstract: It has long been recognized that the management of emergencies requires that response organisations act flexibly, becoming an “emergent organisation” to better manage the fact that disasters do not follow scripts. Nevertheless, recent research shows that crisis response organisations prefer to follow patterns adequate for normal situations. Arguably, the resistance to become an emergent organisation could be related to poor understanding of how to move from disorganisation to self-organisation. We extend a recent system dynamics work by Tu, Wang and Tseng, describing the transition from disorganisation to self-organisation in the Palau case, to analyse the management of disorganisation in the fatal Hatlestad landslide in Norway. We suggest that the causal structure of the system dynamics model describing the Palau and the Hatlestad case should be considered a candidate for an emergent “middle-range theory” describing the management of disorganisation in emergencies. We propose specific data collection to test the candidate theory.

Abstract: Bushfires cause widespread devastation in Australia, one of the most fire-prone countries on earth. Bushfire seasons are also becoming longer and outbreaks of severe bushfires are occurring more often. This creates the problem of having more people at risk in very diverse areas resulting in more difficult mass evacuations over time. The Barwon Otway region in Victoria’s Surf Coast Shire is one such area with evacuation challenges due to its limited routes in and out of coastal areas and its massive population surges during the tourist season and holiday periods. The increasing gravity of the bushfire threat to the region has brought about the Great Ocean Road Decision Support System (GOR-DSS) project, and the subsequent development of a disaster evacuation tool to support emergency management organisations assess evacuation and risk mitigation options. This paper describes the design and development of SEEKER (Simulations of Emergency Evacuations for Knowledge, Education and Response). The SEEKER tool adds another level of intelligence to the evacuation response by incorporating agent-based modelling and allows emergency management agencies to design and run evacuation scenarios and analyse the risk posed by the fire to the population and road network. Furthermore, SEEKER can be used to develop multiple evacuation scenarios to investigate and compare the effectiveness of each emergency evacuation plan. This paper also discusses the application of SEEKER in a case study, community engagement, and training.

Abstract: Natural disasters and emergencies create the need for communication between and among the affected populace and emergency responders as well as other parties such as governmental agencies and aid organizations. Such communications include the dissemination of key information such as evacuation orders and locations of emergency shelters. In particular, the coordination of efforts between responding organizations require additional communication solutions that typically rely heavily on wireless communications to complement fixed line infrastructure due to the ease of use and portability. While the deployment of temporary mobile networks and other wireless equipment following disasters has been successfully accomplished by governmental agencies and network providers following previous disasters, there appears to be little optimization effort involved with respect to maximizing key performance measures of the deployment or minimizing overall cost to deploy. This work does not focus on the question of what entity will operate the portable base stations or wireless equipment utilized during a disaster, only the question of optimizing placement for planning and real time management purposes. This work examines current wireless network optimization models and points out that none of them include the necessary variables for a disaster planning or emergency deployment context. Due to the fact that the choice of wireless technology impacts the nature of an overall model, a brief discussion of exemplar wireless technologies is included. The work also proposes criteria that must be taken into account in order to have a useful model for deployment of mobile base stations and related wireless communications equipment.

Abstract: In this paper we describe our work in progress on RAVEN, a framework, which makes it possible to build applications for collaborative editing of structured data on Android. RAVEN offers developers compile time tools, which use only the schema to generate all database handling components, edit and list user interfaces, as well as those needed for data synchronization, significantly reducing development effort. In addition, RAVEN also offers the ability to do the same work, entirely at runtime, using only a smartphone. With RAVEN it is possible to construct data oriented applications on phone at any time, including during a disaster. Users can share their applications simply by sharing the database and corresponding schema. Thus, RAVEN enables completely decentralized application creation, sharing, and data distribution, avoiding issues of connectivity to centralized resources. In this paper we show that with RAVEN it is possible to construct a new application at runtime and compare the results with an equivalent custom-built application. © 2012 ISCRAM.