IEEE Future Directions
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It is more than smartphones of course! Several other systems are autonomous, able to take local decision and behave accordingly. The gas distribution system auto-detects leaks and halt the flow of gas, similarly the water distribution system can proactively detect contamination and inject disinfectants in the water to keep it safe. Autonomous vehicles self-organise exchanging information on passable routes and will direct caterpillars to the blocked areas. Of course, there are still plenty of “non-autonomous vehicles” but the drivers receive real time data on the status of the roads and can take informed decisions.
Overall the systems keep working within the rules of maximizing the use of resources based on demand and clearly demand may shift significantly after a quake. Because they operate within a set of rules and goals it is much easier for a control centre to adjust the goals and let the various systems to optimise their actions.
In spite of the improved design of buildings and infrastructures the magnitude of the earthquake resulted in high damage, with several buildings that folded onto themselves trapping people inside and even in those that sustained the shock there people were hurt by falling furniture and objects and are waiting for help.
The first to provide it are the neighbours, that are on site and can, differently from the past, have updated information on the surrounding. The fact that cell phones still work, thanks to their capability of creating a self standing local mesh network clearly helps a lot. Notice that this network is being used to provide information on what is going on, not just for calling. So each phone can display a map of the surrounding with indication of critical situations with people in potential need of help (automatically detected by using AI to analyses the movement data provided by the cell phone along with its position in relation to other objects –GPS would be unlikely to work under rubble).
Augmented reality is also providing help since it can transform data into easily understandable localised information.
