Enhancing Emergency Preparedness with Video Tours using Environmental Digital Twins

In today's fast-paced world, effective emergency preparedness and response are crucial for maintaining public safety. Emergency response teams face numerous challenges when arriving at a location during a crisis or event. They often encounter unfamiliar environments and struggle to quickly understand the layout, infrastructure, and potential risks.  However, emerging technologies are revolutionizing the way emergency responders approach these situations. 

One such innovation is the use of video tours on digital twins. These tours provide valuable insights into the environment and facilitate improved collaboration among response teams.

Oversight is a pioneer in that field and its technology helps Israeli emergency agencies better prepare for Jewish holiday of Lag BaOmer pilgrim, which occurred in May 2023. 

Over 8,000 emergency personnel and 140,000 partygoers attended this event in a single evening. 

The occasion was marred by the memory of a fatal crush two years earlier, in which 45 people died scrambling to exit the holy site. This year visitors lit candles in the victims’ memory. 

Personnel were provided with a brief video tour created for this specific event which they could easily follow on their smartphones.  

In this article, we will explore how video tours on a digital twin with different tags, such as pedestrian and car paths, parking lots, regions, and points of interest, can help emergency response teams better understand the environment and collaborate more effectively.

Environmental Digital Twins: A Brief Overview 

Before diving into the benefits of video tours of digital twins, let's briefly understand what a digital twin is. 

Environmental digital twins are virtual representations of a real-world object, system, or environment. It encompasses various data types, including 3D models, sensor data, and geographical information, to create a dynamic and interactive simulation.

Video Tours: An Immersive Experience 

Video tours on environmental digital twins offer an immersive experience by combining real-time or pre-recorded video footage with interactive elements.

Emergency response teams — including the military, police, fire and rescue services — can explore the environment virtually, gaining insights into critical details that aid their decision-making process. 

These tours provide a comprehensive overview of the location, enabling teams to better understand the terrain, structural features, and potential hazards. Moreover, recurring events can be easily upgraded and expanded with this convenient and digital infrastructure. 

To enhance the effectiveness of video tours, different tags can be applied to highlight specific areas and features within the digital twin. Here are some essential tags that can significantly benefit emergency response teams: 

1. 1. Pedestrian and Car Paths: By tagging pedestrian and car paths, responders can quickly identify the most accessible routes for reaching different areas within the location. This information is invaluable in high-stress situations where every second counts.
2.  2. Regions: Dividing the environment into regions allows teams to better understand and analyze different sections. For instance, a large event venue might have distinct areas, such as entrances, main halls, and emergency exits. By tagging these regions, responders can prioritize their actions and allocate resources accordingly. 
3. 3. Points of Interest, Parking Lots and Force deployments: Tagging this information such as fire hydrants, first aid stations, or utility controls, enables response teams to quickly locate critical infrastructure during emergencies. This information streamlines their decision-making process, leading to faster and more effective responses. 

Enhance collaboration and communication. 

In addition to aiding individual responders, this common language will foster collaboration and communication among the entire emergency response team.

1. Shared Understanding: When everyone has access to the same data, they can develop a better understanding of the environment while collaborating. This shared knowledge base promotes more effective communication and coordination during response operations. 
2. Pre-Event Planning: Emergency response teams can conduct virtual walkthroughs on digital twins well before an event or crisis occurs. By exploring the environment together and discussing strategies, they can develop comprehensive response plans. This proactive approach minimizes confusion and maximizes preparedness. 
3. Real-Time Updates: Digital twins can be updated in real-time, allowing response teams to receive the latest information about the environment. For example, if a road becomes inaccessible due to an accident, the digital twin can reflect this change immediately. This enables teams to adapt their response strategies accordingly.

Video tours using environmental digital twins offer significant advantages to emergency response teams. 

These immersive experiences enhance the understanding of unfamiliar environments, facilitate more effective collaboration, enable better decision-making in high-pressure situations and create a common language between different organizations. 

By leveraging the power of digital twins, emergency response organizations can improve their preparedness, response efficiency, and ultimately, public safety. 

As this technology continues to advance, we can expect even more innovative features that will revolutionize the way emergency response teams operate in the future. 

Oversight is an XR software company based in Israel. It was founded in 2021 by former aerospace and electrical engineers who previously worked at one of the top Security Agencies in Israel. Oversight is on a mission to help Emergency Response Teams better prepare for life-and-death missions.