The effects of awareness displays on the coordination of search and rescue missions

When a natural or human-caused disaster, such as flood earthquake or explosion, strikes urban search and rescue (USAR) teams are deployed to the affected area in order to locate; excavate; and treat survivors trapped in the ruins. The deployment of an USAR team to an affected area is called a search and rescue (SAR) mission. During an SAR mission the team members have to work together in extremely hard and dangerous conditions; the goal of the mission being to save as many victims as fast as possible. To achieve this goal coordination between the USAR team members is crucial. This work proposes that the use of an awareness displays system may improve coordination between the members of a USAR team during a SAR mission. Two prototypes of such a system were developed and tested in order to determine it's possible effects on the coordination of an SAR mission. Fig. 1: Rescue worker & dog searching for entombed survivors Source: USAR.nl