{"id":503652,"date":"2022-04-05T19:59:11","date_gmt":"2022-04-06T02:59:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/?post_type=arcnews&#038;p=503652"},"modified":"2022-04-05T08:53:34","modified_gmt":"2022-04-05T15:53:34","slug":"location-sharing-app-proves-key-to-finding-missing-girl","status":"publish","type":"arcnews","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/arcnews\/location-sharing-app-proves-key-to-finding-missing-girl","title":{"rendered":"Location Sharing App Proves Key to Finding Missing Girl"},"author":5752,"featured_media":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sync_status":"","episode_type":"","audio_file":"","castos_file_data":"","podmotor_file_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","itunes_episode_number":"","itunes_title":"","itunes_season_number":"","itunes_episode_type":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[465131,407892,801],"tags":[276152,478102,111,23512,429211],"arcnews_issues":[478332],"class_list":["post-503652","arcnews","type-arcnews","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arcgis-field-maps","category-field-operations","category-operational-intelligence","tag-law-enforcement","tag-location-sharing","tag-real-time","tag-search-and-rescue","tag-tracking","arcnews_issues-spring-2022","arcnews_sections-your-work"],"acf":{"short_description":"While searching for the four-year-old girl and her dog in a rural area, the massive search party relied on real-time GIS to track progress.","pdf":{"host_remotely":false,"file":"","file_url":""},"flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"When a four-year-old girl and her dog went missing in a forested area of Lee County, Alabama, in March 2020, Ken Busby was called to the scene a few hours into the search. As the county\u2019s GIS coordinator, he had already printed out an aerial map of the surrounding area. But Busby knew there was a better way to help the search effort.\r\n\r\n\u201cLet me bring my laptop,\u201d he recalled saying to Rita Smith, the county\u2019s Emergency Management Agency (EMA) director. \u201cLet\u2019s use live GIS to help with tracking everything and see if that can help in real time.\u201d"},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":503662,"image_position":"center","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"Busby contacted Esri\u2019s Disaster Response Program (DRP) team for assistance. He knew he needed location sharing ArcGIS software to help him and other members of the response team, led by Lee County sheriff Jay Jones, coordinate their search and rescue efforts remotely and in real time.\r\n\r\nBy the next morning, the team had access to an ArcGIS mobile app with location sharing capabilities that\u2019s now part of ArcGIS Field Maps. Busby and the rest of the response team were able to put it to work immediately.\r\n\r\nThe search was a massive undertaking, with hundreds of volunteers and multiple agencies participating in the operation, including an equestrian team from Lee County, the United States Marshals Service, emergency management agencies, sheriff\u2019s departments, and fire departments from Lee County and several neighboring counties.\r\n\r\nAfter Busby briefed everyone, all members of the search parties were able to download the location sharing app to their mobile devices.\r\n\r\n\u201cEven people who were volunteers and not part of the coordinated search were able to be included that way,\u201d said Amanda Sides, the girl\u2019s mother, who was also on scene for the duration of the search.\r\n\r\n\u201cEach person that went out got a login [for the app],\u201d said Busby. \u201c[Members of each search party] popped up on the map in the same color. That\u2019s how we kept track of all the groupings. We were sending out five or six different teams from the different agencies that were there, going out in different directions, because we had no idea where [the missing girl] was.\u201d\r\n\r\nAt the incident command post, the team set up monitors to display maps with real-time updates on the location of each search party. Busby was in constant radio contact with the searchers to keep them on the right track.\r\n\r\nBecause of Lee County\u2019s rural setting and wooded terrain, location sharing was vital.\r\n\r\n\u201cOut in the woods, you could get turned around and be heading off in the wrong direction and not even realize it,\u201d said Busby. \u201cWe were able to see in real time where these guys were and keep them heading in the right direction at all times.\u201d\r\n\r\nTo address network connectivity issues in the search area, Verizon provided a mobile tower to boost the wireless cell signal in the area. This helped Busby and the rest of the team stay in touch with search parties to make sure everyone knew where they were supposed to go and which areas they had already covered.\r\n\r\n\u201cHaving that technology, being able to know where you\u2019ve been [and] focus on areas you might not have covered as thoroughly, certainly helped our sheriff\u2019s office and all the search and rescue folks,\u201d said Smith.\r\n\r\nWhen searchers came across the girl\u2019s footprints on the second day, they took pictures of the evidence and emailed them to Busby, who uploaded the geotagged photos to ArcGIS Pro. From there, the response team was able to map the girl\u2019s direction of travel based on the photo locations and project where she had likely gone."},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":503682,"image_position":"center","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"\u201cWe were able to get all that [location-based] information to these searchers. We had professionals in that group who could utilize a lot of that data,\u201d Busby said. \u201cThey know what they\u2019re looking at and know how that\u2019s going to affect their search.\u201d\r\n\r\nBoth GIS mapping and location sharing capabilities allowed the search and rescue team to home in on a specific area of interest. This proved to be a turning point for the search effort.\r\n\r\n\u201cWe were going all different directions and couldn\u2019t concentrate on an area,\u201d said Busby. \u201cNo matter how many people you have, if you can\u2019t concentrate on a specific area, it\u2019s a needle in a haystack. We were able to condense that haystack down to a small handful.\u201d\r\n\r\nBy narrowing the search area, the team was able to locate the girl\u2014and her dog\u2014unharmed, on the third day.\r\n\r\n\u201cIf we didn\u2019t have [location sharing]\u2014I hate to say it, but I don\u2019t know that we would have found her in as good a condition as we did, or as soon as we did,\u201d Busby said.\r\n\r\nAlthough Busby wasn\u2019t previously familiar with the location sharing app, its ease of use and the quick response from Esri\u2019s DRP team enabled the search and rescue team to speedily implement this new capability into its emergency operation.\r\n\r\n\u201cAs soon as I got [access], I was right there,\u201d said Busby. \u201cIt was ready to be put to work.\u201d\r\n\r\nBusby immediately saw the usefulness of ArcGIS location sharing in similar scenarios.\r\n\r\n\u201cSearch and rescue should have access to that [capability] nationwide. In this day and age, to conduct a proper search and rescue mission in the woods, you need something like that,\u201d he said. \u201cEverybody that\u2019s out there looking needs to have [location sharing capabilities] on them. You need to be able to see where everybody\u2019s at [and] where everybody\u2019s going. They need to be able to take pictures of what they see and evidence of what they find, and they need to be able to upload it to a central location where everybody can see and access it.\u201d\r\n\r\nThese location sharing capabilities are available in ArcGIS Field Maps, which also includes data collection and map viewing functionality. Location sharing can also be found in ArcGIS QuickCapture.\r\n\r\nBusby doesn\u2019t routinely deal with emergency response situations, but he advocates strongly for geographic thinking when lives are on the line.\r\n\r\n\u201cI\u2019ve seen firsthand how valuable maps and apps and GIS data are to emergencies,\u201d he said, \u201cand how they can be used to affect the outcome.\u201d\r\n\r\nSmith, who has participated in multiple search and rescue operations, agreed.\r\n\r\n\u201cThere are so many things it can do that have really opened my eyes as an emergency management director,\u201d she said, speaking more broadly about GIS-based emergency response. \u201cIt\u2019s like an untapped resource that we\u2019ve tapped into now.\u201d"},{"acf_fc_layout":"sidebar","layout":"standard","image_reference":null,"image_reference_figure":"","spotlight_image":null,"section_title":"","spotlight_name":"","position":"Center","content":"Learn more about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/en-us\/arcgis\/products\/arcgis-field-maps\/overview\">ArcGIS Field Maps<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/en-us\/arcgis\/products\/arcgis-quickcapture\/overview\">ArcGIS QuickCapture<\/a>. Esri\u2019s Disaster Response Program (DRP) provides software, data coordination, technical support, and other GIS assistance in emergency situations. Find out more <a href=\"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/en-us\/disaster-response\/overview\">information about the DRP<\/a>.","snippet":""}],"references":null},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.9 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Location Sharing App Proves Key to Finding Missing Girl | ArcNews | Spring 2022<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"While searching for the four-year-old girl and her dog in a rural area, the massive search party relied on real-time GIS to track progress.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/about\/newsroom\/arcnews\/location-sharing-app-proves-key-to-finding-missing-girl\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Location 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