#4 4TH ISSUE MAY 2021 IN THIS ISSUE 4TH ISSUE MAY 2021 03 PROGRESS OVER THE PAST 6 MONTHS 04 THE FIRST TWO YEARS OF ACTIVITY 06 THE ITALIAN PILOT OF FASTER PROJECT; MONCALIERI (TURIN) 10 THE FINNISH PILOT OF FASTER PROJECT; KAJAANI (KAINUU) 12 JOINT ACTIVITY WITH OTHER EU H2020 PROJECTS 14 THE FASTER PROJECT PATH TO SUSTAINABILITY PROGRESS OVER THE PAST 6 MONTHS n the last six months a lot of re- demonstrations to be held in the Isults have been achieved and all final months of the project, at the technical tools have been tested in beginning of next year. FASTER has three trial demonstrations (Spain, Italy and Finland). Following these Furthermore, FASTER partners completed the demonstrations, an online debrie- have presented information in 2nd year of its fing meeting was held for each several national and international of the demos with the first re- events with the aim of spreading lifecycle. sponders involved. The purpose news on FASTER and its develop- of these meetings was to collect ments. More info about the events their comments and suggestions are on the FASTER website in the to fine- tune FASTER technolo- Conferences section. gies making them compatible with the existing procedures. Now the technical teams are working to update the tools that will be te- sted in the 2nd and final round of Italian pilot control room in Turin, Piedmont; 27th of January 2021 FASTER NEWSLETTER 3 THE FIRST TWO YEARS OF ACTIVITY FASTER is a 3-year H2020 project that aims to address the challen- ges associated with the protection of First Responders (FRs) in hazar- dous environments, while at the same time enhancing their capabi- lities in terms of situational aware- ness and communication. Having completed its second year and, despite the significant challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic, FASTER has managed to achieve its milestones according to its ori- ginal plan. At this stage, a first integrated ver- sion of the FASTER tools has been produced and demonstrated in 4 pilot activities, testing FASTER’s tools in realistically simulated con- ditions with the participation of front-line FRs. Scenarios were built upon the mission to highlight the applicability and versatility of the FASTER tools in a variety of diver- se settings. An overview is shared below: • Pilot 1 involved an earthqua- ke of 7.3 degrees on the Richter scale, affecting a populated area in Madrid, Spain, and was carried out in November 2020. • Pilot 2 consisted of a flooding scenario based on a similar inci- dent that occurred in November 2016 in the Municipality of Mon- calieri, Italy. The pilot took place in January 2021. • Pilot 3 followed a terrorism sce- nario inside of a school building. This pilot was held in Kajaani, Fin- land in March 2021. • Training was a demonstration of FASTER tools in a hostile envi- ronment, without power or com- munication infrastructure, close to Athens, Greece. The event took place in October 2020. Image from the Spanish pilot, December 2020 4 4TH ISSUE MAY 2021 The 6th FASTER General Assem- evaluation. The project partners bly, held on 30-31 March 2021, have updated the user require- marked a milestone in the FASTER ments, the specifications, and the project pathway. Having comple- architecture of the FASTER tools ted the first round of piloting, all to adhere to the needs of First Re- project partners joined in a fruitful sponders. The coming months will and productive discussion. Tech- see the continuous update of the nical partners shared information tools and the realization of a pilo- and when possible performed ting campaign designed, hosted, live demos of their tools, and end and executed by the project’s end users gave feedback, sharing ide- users, where new use cases will as about possible use cases for the be developed and FASTER tools tools and identifying any new end will be tested and evaluated. The user requirements. Technical part- pilots will be used as a vehicle to ners remain in close and continuo- boost the outreach of the project, us collaboration with end users to empowering the communication achieve a comprehensive analysis and dissemination activities, and of what the latter expect that the creating a clear exploitation path FASTER tools will deliver. The goal for the developed technologies. is to create tools that users wish to adopt and use in their response operations. The General Assembly has also paved the way for the last year of the project. A training and de- monstration campaign in multi- ple locations in Europe and Ja- pan has been developed, going beyond the original planning of the project. Additional piloting events are being planned in France, Por- tugal, Poland, Greece, Spain, Italy, Finland, and Japan. This piloting campaign, with the participation and guidance of technical part- ners, physical or remote, will ma- ximize the opportunity of First Re- sponders from diverse sectors to have a hands-on experience with the tools and provide feedback to fine-tune them. The FASTER con- sortium plans to open up the se- cond round of piloting activities, of- fering to First Responders beyond the consortium to participate and evaluate the project tools, creating clustering, synergy, and exploita- tion opportunities. Summing up, FASTER has suc- cessfully closed its first round of development, demonstration, and Image from the Finnish pilot, March 2021 FASTER NEWSLETTER 5 THE ITALIAN PILOT OF FASTER PROJECT MONCALIERI (TURIN) FASTER’s second trial demon- the Environment for the weather sion assignment/status/details stration was held in Moncalieri forecast, local Municipality of and location information to be (Turin), Italy on January 27, 2021. Moncalieri, Red Cross for rescue exchanged from the command In the two months leading up to operations, Regional Volunteers center and responders in the the event, local organizers from Organizations for the logistics field. Real time information from the Piemonte Region civil pro- and rescue operation support, the field is very useful in the tection were busy setting up, te- Forest Fires Volunteers Regional command center to follow an sting and training on the FASTER Corp to support logistics opera- unfolding emergency situation tools, finalizing the flooding sce- tion. and make response-related de- nario to incorporate the tools, cisions. and organizing and training other It’s to be underlined that during local participating stakeholders. the months leading up to the pi- Using the tool, responders can The result was an intense and lot date the pilot preparation took receive instructions from leaders successful pilot day, demon- place with a deep involvement of in the command room, and send strating and evaluating FASTER all organizations helping the pilot back status updates, location in- tools and proving their added to be carried out, with setting up formation, pictures, videos, and value to the disaster response of training sessions on the tools voice messages to share impor- activities of the regional civil pro- to be tested during the pilot. tant updates from the field. tection agencies. A strong collaboration between They do so using a chatbot In a narrow strip of land near the Piemonte civil protection au- (smartphone) or a smartwatch. the Chisola River in the south of thorities and the FASTER techni- The wearable watches incorpo- Moncalieri (Turin), where a se- cal partners in charge of deve- rate gesture control, meaning vere flooding event took place loping the tools was key to the that with simple wrist movemen- in 2016, FASTER technologies success in planning the event, ts it is possible to send opera- and tools were used in the re- sharing tools by post or remotely tor position, send reports and sponse phases: pre-alarm con- (software downloads), setting up change the current status of the ditions (pre-event preparations), the tools with remote help from operator so if he/she is in activity alarm conditions (rescue opera- technical partners, remote trai- or if he/she has terminated his/ tions), residual critical conditions ning and on pilot day, remote te- her task. (post-event phase). chnical support. Feedback on the MMT was po- Three sites were used simulta- Many tools were tested in the sitive, and participants in the neously for this demonstration: Italian pilot: the Mission Mana- FASTER demonstration could the Piedmont Region command gement tool (MMT), including the assess how easy it was to com- center, and two field locations, two interfaces - the Chatbot and municate with the control room the Chisola river embankment smartwatch -the common ope- and how quickly the information and the New Tetti Piatti village. rational picture (COP) tools, the was delivered. The pilot developed from 9 a.m. 2D mapping tool, drones, the lat- until around 3 p.m., while the ori- ter operated by local authorized G-COP, P-COP, drones, 2D ginal schedule was planned from operators National ‘Carabinieri’ mapping tool. 9 a.m. until 6 p.m.Despite CO- Association, FASTER’s Local VID restrictions 64 operators of Weather Station, Smart Textiles FASTER’s Common Operational the Regional System of Civil Pro- Framework, the ResCuE (RE- Picture (COP) is a map-based tection, 36 of which are associa- Silient CommUnications Equip- tool that integrates data from ted with volunteer organizations, ment) devices, the UAV Relay for other FASTER tools, allowing participated in the event, helping extended communication equip- users to visualize all response greatly to make this event a suc- ment. information in one place. This cess. offers a better understanding Stakeholder groups present in- MMT Chatbot & SmartWatch, of the emergency, ensures that cluded: Piedmont Region at Smart Textiles Framework. all relevant information reaches regional level response (opera- all relevant responders, and tions room), Piedmont Regio- The MMT allows information that they share an understan- nal Agency for the Protection of exchange, including live mis- ding about how the response is 6 4TH ISSUE MAY 2021 Interface of the smartwatch used for the tests in Moncalieri, Italy Red Cross First responders receiving updatest through the chatbot FASTER NEWSLETTER 7 unfolding, supporting decision mental agency.