Hawai’i wildfires response requires fast, reliable network

All communication requires a medium, and when communication flows through electronic networks, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers private property debris removal team relies on George Rogers, an information technology specialist from the Enterprise Emergency Response Team.

Rogers works out of the USACE New Orleans District is currently deployed and manages network operations for the Hawai’i wildfires emergency response mission.

When Rogers isn’t deployed, his primary role maintaining equipment is to ensure it’s deployment ready. EERT members must ensure any computer or network device meets agency software and security policy requirements.

“All year long we’re preparing, upgrading and testing our equipment and ensuring our cache is up to date with the latest software,” said Rogers.

Caches are deployment kits consisting of a router, a switch, wireless access points, a printer and other network devices. Kits may also include satellite phones as a backup for remote areas.

EERT members deploy to support temporary power missions, temporary field offices and to standup and support recovery field offices.

Rogers first deployed as an EERT IT specialist in the 2012 Hurricane Sandy emergency response mission.

“I’ve deployed at least once per year since 2012,” he said. “Every deployment presents different challenges.”

When the EERT members deploy, they survey the field office locations to determine the type of networks they need to establish.

“When we go out on a mission, we do a site visit. We test whether commercial cell phone providers have a strong signal in that area because initially, we may have to work off of cellular or satellite signals,” said Rogers.

According to Terrence Stitt, the Enterprise Emergency Response Division chief of the USACE Regional Management Directorate, the team prefers its members have previous deployment experience and a proven track record of responsiveness to customer needs.

“EERT tries to select seasoned IT professionals with a varied experience. We also like staff to have previous deployment experience working in high-stress situations,” said Stitt. “Customer focus is very important; we cannot always give the customer what they want but we strive to do as much as possible while following current policies and procedures.”

According to Rogers, network bandwidth – the amount of information a user downloads per second – increased significantly in the past five years.

“During the Sandy response, a 45-megabit-per-second download speed was considered fast for an RFO [recovery field office],” said Rogers. “On a field network, we were getting about 1.5 megabits per second. Today, with satellites, speeds can reach 200 megabits per second.”

Megabits describe the amount of information networks can download or upload. Higher speeds equate to faster information flow, which commanders and responders need.

“In today’s fast emergency response environment, missions have moved applications to the cloud and have also gone paperless,” said Stitt. “Meaning that a stable, reliable and fast connection for the duration of emergency response missions is vital to mission success.”