Are You Ready For #SARGIS8?

The National Alliance for Public Safety GIS Foundation's Search & Rescue GIS Working Group is hosting the 8th Annual SARGIS Workshop and Meeting on November 14th-16th, 2016.

Cost - Free! **Space is limited** Training and workshop materials will be provided at no cost.

Location - USGS: 12201 Sunrise Valley Dr, Reston, VA 20192 

What is it about?
SARGIS8 will focus on the capabilities and best practices for Search & Rescue and geospatial technologies with 2 days of hands-on training. 

• Day 1: Monday - Plenary for SAR and GIS practitioners: Keynotes, presentations, & panel discussions (space is limited to 120 participants) 
• Day 2: Tuesday - Two tracks of technical GIS training (Basic/Web GIS & Advanced/Desktop GIS - space is limited to 60 participants)
• Day 3: Wednesday - Two tracks of technical GIS training, culminating in a joint table-top exercise (space is limited to 60 participants)

Who should attend?
Search and Rescue Personnel (paid and unpaid) who want to know more about GIS for SAR
GIS technical professionals & staff that currently support SAR missions and/or are interested in learning how they can help SAR teams
Other Public Safety Operators, Decision makers, & Policy makers

Why Participate?
Join leading local, state, and Federal public safety agencies that are charting new ground for how GIS can be applied to missing person incidents.

Go to this Registration Page for more details and to lock in your place at this event. 

WiSAR Capability and Readiness Assessment Tool

The NAPSG Foundation Search and Rescue Working Group (SARWG) has completed an update to the Capability and Readiness Assessment Tool (CARAT)

What is CARAT? The Capability and Readiness Assessment Tool (CARAT) is a tool created by NAPSG Foundation.  It is designed to serve as a roadmap for public safety officials and GIS practitioners interested in learning how GIS can be applied to the public safety mission and/or in building GIS to support their agencies’ work.

Here is the direct link to the WiSAR CARAT Tool: http://bitly.com/WiSARCARAT

This website provides links to the qualifications and tools that can be used by SAR Teams to understand what geographic information systems have to offer. 

Here are some of the tools listed under 'Crawl'. All of the tools indexed under CARAT can be found in this Group. 

Here is a screenshot of qualifications for Field Data Entry Technician from NAPSG Foundation's Qualification and Credentialing Website.

We are hoping for some constructive feedback in the coming weeks so we can make improvements to the site and generate ideas for training to help SAR Teams get running with GIS for SAR. 

History in the Making: Search and Rescue Working Group (SARWG)

The National Alliance for Public Safety GIS Foundation (NAPSG) and a small group of volunteers produced a charter document to establish a working group under this 501 (C) (3) not-for-profit organization. 

Here is an excerpt.

"The Goal of this Working Group is to create an international network of SAR-based GIS and public safety officials who can share lessons learned, best practices, maps/apps, and other tools and experiences utilizing GIS."

What does this mean?

This means we have representation. 

After seven years of coming together as a community via the SARGIS discussion group, we finally have an affiliation to connect ourselves to. This will provide support for our yearly meeting through accountable fundraising and help us produce training materials and best practice documents. We can interact with government agencies and tell them who we are and what we stand for.

Plus this will connect us to an international community of GIS and public safety professionals who work on similar challenges may be interested in sharing best practices and collaborating.

Who is NAPSG?

The National Alliance for Public Safety GIS Foundation. 

Their mission is "to support the public safety and homeland security communities in the advancement of data interoperability and information sharing, through geospatial technology, in support of local and national emergency preparedness."

See their website for more information: http://www.napsgfoundation.org/

How can I get involved?

We will continue to use the SARGIS discussion group. 

Howerver, over the next year we plan to:

• Host our first meeting, in conjunction with SARGIS7 (date and location TBD).
• Provide a list of software and training resources on an interactive website.
• Review the operational and functional needs for GIS in all search and rescue operations.

If any of these initiatives interest you, stay tuned for more information on how to get involved. We will need your help!

#MapSAR now available for ArcGIS 10.2

Jon Pedder from Sierra Madre SAR just released a version of MapSAR that will work on ArcGIS Desktop 10.2. MapSAR for 10.2 will be posted to www.mapsar.net ASAP but it is also available for download from ArcGIS Online from the WiSAR Applications Group. 

For those of you interested in contributing to the MapSAR Project by testing the template or developing tools, please see the MapSAR GitHub repository. 

The goal of MapSAR is to help: 

• Create and edit field task assignments
• Monitor progress of assignments
• Support logistics/communications
• Document clues, team location and status
• Incorporate GPS data
• Store all incident data into a single repository
• Create and print maps

If you are unsure if you have access to ArcGIS Software and work on a volunteer SAR Team please see the Esri Non-Profit Organization Program. If you feel you may not qualify for this program please send an email to help@mapsar.net. Free training videos are also available on the NAPSG YouTube channel.

Great work Jon and Team for getting this version out!

Also - I have added a download page for a set of ArcGIS Explorer Desktop tools here: Search and Rescue Tools for ArcGIS Explorer Desktop. Please see this page for more details.


***Update - I just updated the item page for downloading MapSAR 10.2, apparently some tools did not zip up. Also, this version can be used for 10.1 as well. 

#MapSAR Training modules kicking off right now

Jon Pedder and Art Fortini are here at the Sierra Madre SAR Cache in California launching the MapSAR training modules via webinar: Training Announcement 

Thank you NAPSG for all of your support!

NAPSG will make the training videos available (www.youtube.com/user/napsggis)

and I will announce the location here. For those of you assisting with the flood response in

Colorado - please be safe and let us know if you need our help.

UPDATE: If you missed the event or want a recap - the slides and video are posted here: 

http://www.napsgfoundation.org/blog/news/147-mapsar-virtual-training

NAPSG & MapSAR Virtual Training: Wildland Search and Rescue

For more information and sign-up visit the NAPSG link directly: http://events.r20.constantcontact.com/register/event?oeidk=a07e815v7w25372c4c4&llr=nplxpbdab

Saturday September 14, 2013 from 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM EDT
Add to Calendar 

Please join NAPSG Foundation and our partners at MapSAR for a special training session on the MapSAR geospatial tool set. Maps are at the core of any Search & Rescue operation.  MapSAR, a combination of maps and GIS technology, helps us to conduct operations so that search teams get out the door more quickly, find those who are lost, and bring them home safely.

Experienced SAR instructors, GIS specialists and NAPSG are excited to offer this no-cost training seminar to show how public safety can incorporate MapSAR geospatial technology into the public safety mission.  Take this opportunity to learn first-hand from SAR members who have successfully used MapSAR in the field to complete their mission.

The purpose of this training is to:

• ·        Introduce how SAR and other public safety operations can benefit from GIS.
• ·        Introduce the MapSAR software (a free download).
• ·        Learn how MapSAR can help with planning and mapping within ICS operations.

While MapSAR is designed for the wildland environment, this training session is not limited to wildland responders.  At NAPSG's recent Northeast Summit, MapSAR was successfully taught to a wide mix of public safety officials - including urban SAR, structural fire, and law enforcement personnel.

NAPSG Wildland MapSAR Training in Bellevue, Washington

NAPSG Wildland MapSAR Training in Bellevue, Washington
Registration is now open to participate in a free training session.

Saturday April 6, 2013 -to- Sunday April 7, 2013 

Participants will learn how to use the free MapSAR tool with Esri’s ArcGIS Desktop product. The product and training session are designed for individuals with limited or no GIS experience.
GIS has proven to be beneficial when mapping emergency incidents. This class will teach you how to create search segments (probability areas), draw search assignments and print maps for field crews and the incident command post. You will also learn how to track incident activities like clues, field team status, debriefing information and GPS track logs.
This is a hands-on training class: computers, textbooks, reference manuals and software will be provided for up to 50 students.
NAPSG and Esri will be sponsoring the event.
NAPSG is the National Alliance for Public Safety GIS. This is their mission, "To support the public safety and homeland security communities in the advancement of data interoperability and information sharing, through geospatial technology, in support of local and national emergency preparedness".