Location based early disaster warning and evacuation system on mobile phones using OpenStreetMap

Abstract

Natural Disasters have threatened mankind since history started. Due to geographic position and climate change, Bangladesh is one of most vulnerable countries to natural disasters. The country also lacks effective disaster preparedness system to confront natural disasters. Timely disaster warning and evacuation guideline can save lives of the people. In addition, a tourist or a blind people may face difficulties in finding safe area or shelter place prior to the occurrence of natural disasters. For this reason, we have proposed a location based early disaster warning and evacuation system for both normal and blind people using OpenStreetMap (OSM). The system is implemented on android mobile phone because of the burgeoning growth of smart phones in Bangladesh. So, our system comprises a third-party server named Disaster Management Server (DMS), android device with our application installed on it and user. The local weather office updates the disaster (tsunami, cyclone or flood) data on DMS. Device user registers on Android Cloud to Device Messaging (C2DM) server to get automatic notification of upcoming disaster otherwise user gets manual notification. The user communicates with DMS to have updated data sending the current position obtained by GPS or network provider. The probable disaster affected area is determined by ray casting algorithm. When our application recognizes the user in probable disaster zone then application will disseminate visual and audio disaster warning and evacuation guideline including shortest path of shelter or safe zone on the map of the application. Evacuation progress is also tracked using DMS and national identification of user. The experimental result demonstrates the effectiveness of our system.