Using the android smartphone and twitter to generate an emergency flood alert
On 16th of June 2010, heavy rains in Singapore’s central shopping district in Orchard Road caused several basement shopping malls and car parks to be submerged in water. Over 70 members of the public needed to be rescued from danger. Another significant flooding in December 2011 caused the basement area of Far East Shopping centre and Lucky Plaza to be flooded. This resulted in the loss of millions of dollars worth of electrical goods, jewellery as well as customer patronages. It also caused the temporary closing of the recently opened burger chain store Wendy’s.
Using an Android smartphone with the EMANT380 DAQ module, a group of students from NTU EEE tackled the problem of mass alert to interested persons. By measuring the flood water level and tweeting the results allow those affected by the flood to take preventive actions. Twitter is a better mass broadcast system (and FREE) compared to existing SMS solutions.
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