Could this application have saved lives lost in the Kerala floods?

Could there have been a way to save 483 people, who lost their lives in century’s worst floods in Kerala? The answer is a resounding yes! According to Rajkot-based computer scientist Alpana Upadhyay (45) and her industrial engineer son Maulin (24), who have developed an artificial intelligence and algorithm-based evacuation application, effective disaster management using their invention would have possibly saved all the lives that were lost in Kerala floods.

An efficient data-based evacuation plan is at the core of their application which can be used in any kind of disaster that requires shifting people to safety in urban or rural areas. They got inspiration to develop it after being stuck in a hurricane in Houston, USA, in 2017 when they saw people running helterskelter due to panic and lack of clear instructions from government agencies.

The application

Alpana, who’s head of the MCA department at Sunshine College in Rajkot, told Mirror, “Our application ‘Escape the Hurry’ is nothing but a well-planned and comprehensive evacuation mechanism which notifies citizens which path would lead them to safety during a disaster. It involves setting up of a central city server with details like name, address, phone numbers, email ids etc of citizens which would notify citizens about evacuation plan during times of disaster.

“For example, during floods the server would process information like location and source of flooding, rate of rising water level, high against low water level locations, impact time (projecting water levels in X time) to deduce safe and unsafe locations. The server will notify citizens through text message, email, mobile app or social media about the shortest route to safety. It would also inform the government agencies that citizens living in XYZ area need to be evacuated while those in ABC area don’t face danger and can stay where they are.”

She and her son Maulin, who’s an industrial engineer from the US, developed the system after a year-long research. After penning a book by the title “Escape the Hurry: Evacuation Planning Using Advanced Data Analytics”, they filed for a patent of their application in India in December 2017.

Testing the application

Alpana said when they carried out experiments or ran simulations using their system, the notification success rate was 98.7%. The duo plan to present the system to disaster management department of Gujarat and later other states. “If they are ready to develop a product from this system, we would be happy to provide it for free,” she said.

Cost of using the system

When asked about the cost of developing a disaster management system using their system, Alpana said, “The cost of implementation would vary from place to place. For a city like Rajkot where I live, the cost involved would be about Rs 20 lakh. In fact, CM Vijay Rupani wrote us a letter and appreciated our effort towards effective evacuation during disasters.”