“Flood Action VR: A Virtual Reality Framework for Disaster Awareness and Emergency Response Training” by Sermet and Demir

  • ©Yusuf Sermet and Ibrahim Demir

  • ©Yusuf Sermet and Ibrahim Demir

  • ©Yusuf Sermet and Ibrahim Demir

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Entry Number: 27

Title:

    Flood Action VR: A Virtual Reality Framework for Disaster Awareness and Emergency Response Training

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Abstract:


    Natural disasters constitute unexpected and severe threats with devastating effects on communities worldwide. Recent studies emphasize the importance of public awareness and training of first responders in disaster preparedness and response activities. This paper presents a virtual reality framework that creates a realistic 3D gaming environment with real-time and historical weather and disaster conditions. Main goals of the project are to increase public awareness about disasters by using gamification techniques, and train and evaluate emergency responders by simulating real-life scenarios. The system is supported by voice recognition to interact with the virtual world, and analyze user’s actions and voice to detect emotional and psychological state.

References:


    • Kate Burningham, Jane Fielding, and Diana Thrush. 2008. ’It’ll never happen to me’: understanding public awareness of local flood risk. Disasters 32, 2 (2008), 216–238.
    • Michael Hicks and Mark Burton. 2017. Hurricane Harvey: Preliminary Estimates of Commercial and Public-Sector Damages on the Houston Metropolitan Area. Ball State University (2017).
    • Naim Kapucu. 2008. Collaborative emergency management: better community organizing, better public preparedness and response. Disasters 32, 2 (2008), 239–262.
    • Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman. 2004. Rules of play: Game design fundamentals. MIT press.

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Acknowledgements:


    This project is based upon work supported by the Iowa Flood Center and the University of Iowa.


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