Using group storytelling to recall information in emergency response

People and organizations frequently need to recall past events that, for some reason, were not documented when they occurred. The successful reconstitution of past events depends on several variables, such as whether key people are still available to tell what they know. This is especially true in emergency scenarios, where it is important to learn from past events in order to better prepare for future ones. In this paper, we describe a group storytelling approach to support knowledge acquisition from emergency respondents. This activity is supported by a groupware and yields a semi-structured account of past events, which can be later retrieved. We also present a case study with an actual emergency response team.