LOW COST WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS AND SMARTPHONE APPLICATIONS FOR DISASTER MANAGEMENT AND IMPROVING QUALITY OF LIFE

Raghu Teja Mulukutla, Anurag Mondal, Sourabh Bollapragada, Gopal Mulukutla, Sandeep Kumar Ladi

Abstract: Spatially distributed Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) comprising low-cost components (sensors, Microcontrollers, wireless communication devices) provide a way to measure several quantitative variables of nature and the human environment (air, temperature, soil temperature, precipitation and water quality). Owing to the increased human intervention in nature, there is a rise in unpredictability of weather and natural environment . This causes human induced disasters such as long dry periods, flash floods,subsequent landslides, heat-island effect, sea-level rise, beach erosion. Very often the effects of disasters natural or manmade are regional and early warning infrastructure may not be sufficient. In this paper we address disaster preparedness and prevention by utilizing low cost WSNs to monitor the region and designingfreeAndroid cloud application to instantly notify users, an occurrence of a disaster. The deployment of the WSN is done using various interconnected nodes across the region. Each node consists of a low cost Arduino Microcontroller, Xbee radio communication module and sensors which measure data substantial to detect a disaster. Each node collects data and sends through line of sight to a central station. This station is a server which collects and sends the data to the cloud where it is stored and inspected for detecting a dangerous situation. The cloud also maintains the sensor data in an online database periodically. We will demonstrate a smartphone application which communicates with the cloud so that notifications are sent in real time when a disaster is detected to alert the users located within the WSN area, helping in early evacuation, finding nearby safety shelters etc. We show that by establishing a synergy between Smartphone and reliable modern sensors like ground motion sensors(for early warning of earthquakes), soil moisture sensors (for early warning of drought), flow sensors (for early warning offloods) in WSN will improve the quality of life by ensuring safety against disasters

Keywords: disaster prevention, wireless network, smartphone alerts during disaster, early evacuation, safety shelters, early detection, disaster alert, sensors, disaster, flow sensor, ground motion sensor.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15623/ijret.2014.0328014