CREATING A MODERN EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS PLATFORM
The American Red Cross approached 3 Sided Cube with the idea of a platform that allowed users to prepare for, respond to, and recover from natural disasters.
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3m
downloads
3b+
alerts
46
weather alerts
THE CHALLENGE?
Mother nature can be devastating, so our disaster management app needed to be robust enough that people could rely on it. The American Red Cross approached 3 Sided Cube with the idea of a platform that allowed users to prepare for, respond to, and recover from natural disasters.
The non-digital methods of preparing for disasters were not reaching a wide enough audience, and there was an obvious need for a digital solution – specifically a mobile app development project that could educate people so they would know what to do in emergency situations, alert them when they’re in immediate danger and providing all the tools they need to make sure their friends and family are safe.
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THE SOLUTION
A native app that allows you to monitor more than 46 different climate-affected emergency alerts in your town, and other cities that matter to you, such as hurricanes, earthquakes, and tornados.
This platform for the American Red Cross allows them to communicate with the population in an entirely new way, providing a real-time solution during numerous disasters and enabling users to contact loved ones to let them know they’re safe, find the nearest shelter and track the storm.
The app offers invaluable information on how best to prepare your home and make plans with family before a disaster strikes, and gives advice to aid recovery. The app also allows for the real-time addition of much needed content (such as food/shelter locators and open gas stations) which is critical in the wake of a disaster. The app revolutionised how the American Red Cross communicates with people, before, during and after a disaster. Within the disaster management community it’s proving to be the blueprint for how disaster management agencies can use mobile to help people.
WHAT DOES THE APP DO?
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PREPARING FOR THE WORST
Fact files, quizzes and survival games make education and learning how to prepare for disasters a little more entertaining and engaging.
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TRACKING DISASTERS
Know where and when the storm is going to hit, which dangers you'll be experiencing and which areas these dangers will be affecting.
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PLANNING TO EVACUATE
Use the live map to locate Red Cross shelters so that you can plan the best route to evacuate.
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EMERGENCY ALERTS
If you're in danger, you'll know about it. Receive alerts that tell you when a disaster is about to strike, and which dangers you should be preparing for.
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MAKING SURE YOUR FAMILY KNOWS YOU'RE SAFE
Set up custom messages for your friends and family. Make sure that in the chaos of a catastrophe, those most precious to you know that you are not in danger.
3 Sided Cube has been able to help us design and build an easy-to-use content management system that requires almost no training. The app that they have developed is really stable and really reliable so that very little support is needed.
During Hurricane Sandy in 2012, the app was #2 US. As a result of its success, the app was featured as part of the White House’ Safety Datapalooza, showing how apps can be used in a disaster scenario.
The app was also utilised throughout Hurricane Harvey which caused the worst flooding disaster in US history. While the American Red Cross were mobilising relief workers to support response efforts and help those in need, we were busy 7,732 km away making sure that the app didn’t crash and could be relied on. At the peak of the storm, we were receiving 5,500 server requests per minute for emergency information.
In response to the increased frequency of wildfires destroying communities and claiming lives, the Wildfire Enhancement was available on the Emergency app from August 2023 to allow users to see local wildfire risk and create a personalised wildfire plan. Increase your wildfire preparedness level by completing actions under four goals:
Make your wildfire evacuation plan
Create defensible space
Protect yourself from wildfire smoke
Get involved with community efforts
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