More than 370 veteran-led Disaster Relief Australia (DRA) volunteers and another 341 spontaneous and corporate volunteers have been working out of Coraki, NSW, to support flood recovery efforts near Lismore.
To help manage where the efforts are directed – and ensure volunteers are kept safe – DRA deployed Nova Systems’ Global Alerting Platform (GAP) to provide real-time location information and SOS emergency alerting across both cellular and satellite networks.
"Disaster Relief Australia is doing an incredible job helping devastated communities with the flood recovery and we are grateful to be able to provide this platform to assist in connecting and protecting volunteers.”
Paul Weiss, Nova Systems Director of Business Development and Alliances
“We’ve found mobile coverage hasn’t been reliable at times, so our teams were using a combination of cellular and satellite devices as required, ensuring we can see everyone on a real-time, interactive map in the command centre,” DRA’s CEO Geoff Evans said.
“Given the ever-changing situation and high-risk zones, it’s a gamechanger to have reliable eyes on our people to help with directing resources and to be able to alert volunteers if they are approaching a danger zone.
“The recovery from an event like this is a long one. We have had veteran-led volunteers on the ground working with volunteers from the local community for several weeks to help with clearing roads, removing rubbish and getting people get back into their homes.”
Nova Systems Director of Business Development and Alliances, Paul Weiss, said: “Disaster Relief Australia is doing an incredible job helping devastated communities with the flood recovery and we are grateful to be able to provide this platform to assist in connecting and protecting volunteers.”
DRA is a not-for-profit organisation, which has supported communities with disaster relief and emergency management operations since 2016 and has put their volunteer workforce on stand-by to help get people back into their homes as soon as flood waters reside.
It unites the skills and experiences of Australian Defence Force veterans, emergency responders and civilians to rapidly deploy disaster relief teams domestically and around the globe. During this latest event, 526 jobs were completed, saving the community $1.4 million.
Nova Systems’ GAP connects, protects and optimises people and things. Nova Systems works with their global partners to build communications solutions for lone workers, vehicle telematics, business travel, asset tracking, IoT and beyond.