STH activities : Use of cell phones and social media in disaster communication - our experience in the Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya with a Whats App Group 'HAZARD ALERTS 1&2'

 

I have always been fascinated by the digital platform and its ability to record and disburse information quickly, accurately and efficiently to a large number of people and so I started this blog in Sep 2007 when SaveTheHills (STH) was formed. The blog has till date 375,052 hits & has a record of almost 12 years of landslide as well as rainfall activity of the region.
I have since made STH accounts in virtually all other major social media platforms ie Facebook, Instagram and Twitter though I have never got around to using them.
What I have used, however and which has become the STH flagship is our Whats App (WA) group 'HAZARD ALERTS' or HA which was created approx 5 years ago with the intent of disbursing heavy rainfall warnings and alerts to common people so that they become more aware and perhaps pass on the warnings to others as well.
I am glad to say that HA has become a very successful and disciplined crowd sourced platform and a knowledge bank in our region on many environmental issues of the Himalayas and messages and warnings in HA are read by a large number of people in our area even though WA only allows a maximum of 250 members.
Today HA has 244 members of which approx 25 or so are PhDs who can throw light on issues or queries which we layman have. Then we have a large number of NGOs and media people who not only pass warnings to others but also serve as vital communication links to inform about hazards, landslides, highway status and so on. We also have a large number of government officials who also participate in crowd source knowledge disbursement and information and last of all we have the lay people for whom HA was actually formed - so that they are better informed and aware of impending hazards, heavy rainfall periods and take action. All in all HA has been a wonderful experiment which has been very successful.
Since we were about to run out of space, we have formed Hazard Alerts 2  (HA2) which has approximately 50 members till now - mostly students. All posts from HA are simultaneously posted in HA2.
In Feb2021, we (my STH colleague Dr Nima Doma Lama and I) made a 5 min 'lightning presentation' on HAZARD ALERTS  for SHEAR which is available on YOUTUBE here. Do have a listen and we would be more than happy to share our experience with you.

Praful Rao
Kalimpong district
Darjeeling-Sikkim Himalaya