Elastic disaster early warning system using a cloud-based communication center

An elastic early warning system enables people and authorities to save lives and property in case of disasters. In case of floods, a warning issued with enough time before the event will allow for reservoir operators to gradually reduce water levels, people to reinforce their homes, hospitals to be prepared to receive more patients, authorities to prepare and provide help. In this paper is presented an elastic disaster early warning system application that represents a “cloudified” early warning solution for natural disasters. The application collects data from real time sensors, processes the information, and provides warning services for the public. The system should be capable of collecting and processing the sensor data in nearly real time, and thus allowing very rapid response to urgent events. The main contribution of this paper consists in the presentation of the communication center with cloud computing clients that will be integrated with the early warning system.