PUBLIC PARTICIPATION IN GIS VIA MOBILE APPLICATIONS FOR CRISIS MANAGEMENT PROCESS: A CASE STUDY OF AN EARTHQUAKE, TEHRAN, IRAN

Abstract. The effects of earthquakes on societies are greater than what most people think. These effects range from structural damages to economic impacts and fatalities. An earthquake only lasts for a few seconds and the aftershocks may continue for days, but the damage does continue for years. The lack of integrated and automated tools for estimating resources needed in the aftermath of an earthquake during the disaster response phase motivate the design and implementation of a comprehensive, interactive, and user-friendly model. The objective of this research is to use geospatial analyses for examining vulnerable areas and evaluating the hazard of building damage by earthquake. Hence, the effective parameters of damage are identified and by using the fuzzy inference, the degree of damage in the study area is determined. Subsequently, with the provision of internet service in a troubled region, it is possible to collect voluntary information from people in the region using their mobile smartphones. For this purpose, an app in the Android Studio environment has been developed for convenience and sending the exact location of the affected sites. Moreover, the result of this research identified areas with a high priority for relief and optimal use of time, especially in the early hours of the crisis.