Recent News

Sept. 11, 2007: The City of Ontario, CA issued a press release announcing the official availability of the Disaster Portal. The site is now available as a link from the City of Ontario website.

Sept. 12, 2007: The Ontario Disaster Portal was the subject of a Daily Bulletin newspaper article.

RESCUE Disaster Portal

The Disaster Portal is an easily customizable web portal and a set of component applications which can be used by first-responders to provide the public with real-time access to information related to disasters and emergency situations. Current features include a situation overview with maps, announcements and press information, emergency shelter status, and tools for family reunification and donation management.

The Disaster Portal is being developed by the RESCUE Project in order to make next-generation dissemination and situational awareness technologies available to first responders and the public, as well as to provide a platform for continued research by RESCUE project members.

A pilot deployment of the Disaster Portal has been in use by the City of Ontario since mid-2007.

Key Benefits

The Disaster Portal can dramatically improve communication between first-responder / government agencies and the public. Using the Disaster Portal, first-responders can quickly disseminate information to a wide audience. Disaster Portal complements other systems such as telephone hotlines and can help reduce the load on those systems by allowing self-service to the information. It also provides interactive maps and other rich content which cannot be easily shared via phone or other traditional means. Media contacts can be directed to access press releases on the site and subscribe to receive automatic email or pager notifications when new content is posted. The Disaster Portal also provides increased opportunities for civic participation via the Donation Management and Family Reunification applications.