Open Questions
On of the original ideas was a way to show how citizens pay for wildfires. We pay through taxes, because putting out wildfires is waaay more expensive than preventing them.
But prevention is not a priority in forest management. Please see our interview with
Right now, the fire location system only gets a general location for the fire. What may be useful is a way to know if a fire spreads into the radius the user chooses.
Just because our data shows a fire, doesn't mean that fire can't spread closer to the home of the user. I'm not sure this problem can be solve at this level. But it's worth a look.
It would be worth looking at current and historical weather data for the prediction of fires.
Reverse 911 systems:
The difference between our app and traditional reverse-911 systems, is the user can choose when they want to be alerted. They can choose a radius, then we alert them when a fire appears in their area.
How would communicating with your friends and neighbors improve this app? One original idea was to have this app be a way to team up with neighbors when evacuating a dangerous fire area. Could the app have a way to organize ride-sharing for neighbors? So everyone isn't trying to evacuate in their own cars. This could potentially reduce traffic jams when people are supposed to evacuate a wildfire area.