Testbed for high-speed end-to-end communications in support of comprehensive emergency management
C.W. Bostian, Scott F. Midkiff, Timothy M. Gallagher, Christian James Rieser, Thomas W. Rondeau, W. Michael Kurgan, Laurence W. Carstensen, Gwyn Morgan, Dennis G. Sweeney, Jonathan Hood · International Conference on Digital Government Research · 2003
We are completing the fourth and final year of our project Testbed for High-Speed 'End-to-End' Communications in Support of Comprehensive Emergency (NSF Award 9983463) [1]. Our original 1999 proposal envisioned building an operational high-capacity rapidly deployable communications system for disaster response. It would seamlessly link first responders with all local, state, and national command centers and resources. Reviewers liked the proposed system but felt that the project might be an infrastructure application, and some asked, Where is the new research? We satisfied their concerns, and the project was ultimately funded at about half the $3M original budget. The funding limitation was dictated by the limits of NSF's resources for a single project of this kind. The final budget was front-loaded so that we could construct the minimum prototype equipment and (it was assumed) then get money for the operational phase from agencies like the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).