During my second week of stay in the Sorsogon Provincial Disaster Risk and Reduction Office, I got an opportunity to talk with the head of the agency. Engr. Renan Dimaano, a civil engineer by profession. He is the head of the office and the one in-charge of running the agency in attaining its objective. He showed me the current system being utilized by the office in handling disaster and rescue operations. For disaster management, the agency needs to monitor a lot of information in order to provide good intervention and decision making. For the rescue operation, a good and reliable communication line must be available for proper dispatch and order dissemination. For a province consisting of 12 municipalities, this will not be an easy task. Engr. Dimaano showed me the system that they are currently using. Most of these are provided by the national government through NDRRMC and the PAGASA-DOST. They utilized these systems in monitoring upcoming typhoon especially in determining possible tracks and typhoon intensities. In monitoring local situations, like floods, rain volume, and volcanic activities, they are also provided by the provincial government and foreign agencies that they were able to reach upon during foreign visits by the provincial officials. Among these instruments is the rain gauge donated by Germany that allowed them to remotely monitor rain volume in the entire province from their office without having to personally go to the vicinity. This instrument was damaged by typhoon Glenda and he wanted me to assess the status of the instrument and possible give some recommendations on how to to bring the instrument back to operation. He explained to me that several sensors were scattered in the entire province throwing information to a central relay station. This relay station is the one responsible for consolidating the data and forwarding this information to SPDRRMO for evaluation and analysis. The system is currently down and they have no idea where the problem could possibly be. He wanted me to visit the sensor sites and make ocular inspection in order to derive necessary recommendations. Their initial assessment is that the sensors were damaged by the typhoon or the relay station was the one not functioning properly. An ocular visit was scheduled next week for situation assessment.
The Sorsogon Province is composed of 12 municipalities and managing the province requires a reliable system and technology in order to be managed efficiently. As of the moment, it is still very important for them to have an actual view of the situation before they can make good judgement. Aside from the data being provided to them by technology, they still require site visit or actual verification by their staff on situations involving critical judgement. One example of this is the flood monitoring system. They have technology to monitor flood levels in some critical rivers and low lying areas. The system is called Local Flood Early Warning System (LFEWS). LFEWS was provided to them by PAGASA DOST. Aside from the usual information provided by LFEWS, the agency (SPDRRMO) would like to have a more reliable verification method which will serve as a basis for them in making decisions. As of the moment what they do is ask one of their staff assigned in a particular critical location to personally assess the situation, look at the flood levels and communication to them through radio his assessment of the situation before a decision will be made. Engr. Dimaano asked me if it would be possible to install a device equipped with camera which is battery operated charged by solar panel in the area which is capable of giving them visuals of remote areas without obliging them to personally visit the site. What I told them is that the viability of such technology will depend on the current communication facilities available on the site. The big challenge in the concept that he is asking is the method of delivering video recording or real-time visuals from the site to the control unit. I promised to him that I will provide design of possible device that could provide them their need. I will present to him the concept the moment he visit again the office.
As of the moment, I am creating a design for a device that can capture high definition video which will work on a 12 volt battery so that it can be installed in a remote area. In the next days I will be consulting a friend who is an Electronics and Communications Engineer by profession to ask for the best method to relay video stream or video clip over wide range. Engr. Dimaano also mentioned that if I will be able to come up with a design, we will making a proposal for the provincial government to ask for funding for the implementation of the project. - Aris J. Ordonez
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