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Mission Manager Accepting Enrollment for Advanced Training Workshop, June 2-3, Geared to Public Safety First Responders

Mission Manager is now accepting enrollment for its 2-day Advanced Training Workshop, scheduled June 2-3, 2016, at its San Diego headquarters. Students will receive intensive, hands-on training required to fully implement Mission Manager’s cloud-based incident management system into their organizations. They’ll learn how to configure and customize Mission Manager for their agency’s day-to-day operations and live deployments, and participate in
exercises involving multiple agencies from multiple jurisdictions.

Scenarios will range from active shooters and natural disasters to search-and-rescue (SAR) operations and large-scale public events. Participants will learn how to create an online command center and share information as a unified command using Mission Manager’s robust mapping tools and communications log. The course is geared to first responders from law enforcement, fire and rescue, emergency operation centers and SAR/K9 teams.

Students will learn how to:

  • Manage and track members’ qualifications and team equipment
  • Callout members using filters; manage personnel responses
  • Configure your team per agency type for multi-agency deployments
  • Check in/out unaffiliated members and volunteers
  • Maintain and track event logs
  • Create offline missions
  • Track members’ hours in customizable categories
  • Import files such as KMZ/KML to create custom maps
  • Learn tips and tricks on using map layers, overlays & elements
  • Produce debriefs and editable NIMS/ ICS reports

For more information, including pricing, please call 619-457-6119 or email info@missionmanager.com

DOWNLOAD AGENDA FLYER HERE or click below.

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Learn How an Automated Incident Management Software Tool can Improve Emergency Preparedness and Response – Anywhere at Anytime in the Cloud

Today’s emergency managers face enormous pressure when faced with a natural disaster, as evidenced by the major floods, hurricanes and fires that have devastated parts of the nation in recent months. Agency leaders need to be prepared – long before a disaster strikes – so they can deploy the right people with the right qualifications at a moment’s notice.

During deployments, emergency managers / incident commanders need to effectively manage their field-deployed personnel and spontaneous volunteers.  They need to see a common operational picture to make split-second decisions, and quickly produce reports for legal compliance and reimbursements.

However, field leaders often have inadequate situational awareness due to geographical and device restraints. The traditional method of managing incidents with pen-and-paper, push-pin boards and traditional paper maps are EMgraphic1inefficient and not shareable.  It is also difficult and expensive for first responders to communicate across the myriad of communications networks and radio systems.

Add to that the laborious process of managing a team’s assets and personnel data – including members’ medical history, training and certifications – using manual spreadsheets. Additionally, preparing after action reports required for federal reimbursements can be a time-consuming, administrative-heavy task.

Reducing the Burden with Automation

The good news is that incident management software tools like Mission Manager can automate the entire process – improving efficiency and effectiveness of front-line responders and their agencies.

An automated solution significantly reduces the burden for emergency managers and incident commanders, allowing them to focus on protecting the public.  It also saves their agencies money by reducing overtime hours and consolidating disparate systems.

Cloud-based Mission Manager provides a one-stop integrated solution for team and asset management, real-time communications, situational awareness with robust maps, and automated reporting capabilities.

Mission Manager can help emergency management agencies become more proactive vs. reactive – and ultimately improve response times – because it is based on the core principles of “Preparation. Readiness. Execution.”

Managing Teams and Missions on a Common Operating Platform

As a daily team management tool, Mission Manager provides the current status and qualifications of members, including training, certifications and expirations. Administrators can also easily track and manage their team’s equipment and maintenance schedules.

Because this data is readily available, emergency managers can quickly determine who is qualified and available to respond when an emergency strikes.

When used as an online command center, Mission Manager helps ensure 360-degree situational awareness. It provides a common operational picture – on multiple devices – that can be shared among agencies in multiple jurisdictions that are responding to the mission.

Mission Manager features robust mapping capabilities with more than 90 mapping overlays, including topography, natural hazards, locations of hospitals and police departments, as well as social media feeds at points of interest.

Highly secure and customizable, Mission Manager’s robust database provides a second-by-second record of every event. This data can be easily exported for ICS NIMS compliant reports.

Mission Manager has supported more than 6,500 missions around the world since 2011, ranging from single-person rescues to large public events and full-scale natural disaster response. Mission Manager is currently used in all 50 U.S. states, and on every continent except Antarctica. Truly a global tool, Mission Manager is available in 80 languages.

To learn how Mission Manager can assist your agency, email us at info@missionmanager.com or call 877-257-8240.

Mission Manager Incident Command Tracking Capabilities Tested at Multi-Jurisdictional Search-and-Rescue Exercise (NCR SAREX) in the National Capital Region

LORTON, VA, October 2015 – In a first-ever training event involving seven law enforcement agencies in the National Capital Region (NCR), Mission Manager was put to the ultimate test as officials compared the incident management software with traditional paper methodologies during a mock search for a missing family at NCR SAREX.

Sponsored by the Fairfax County Police Department, the multi-jurisdictional Search-and-Rescue Exercise, or SAREX, was held Oct. 16-17 at the Mason Neck State Park that is bordered by the Potomac River, Occoquan River and neighboring communities in Lorton, Va.

SAREX briefing

Searchers receive a briefing about their mission (Photo courtesy: WTOP/Mike Murillo)

It was a grueling 36-hour exercise that involved approximately 80 participants from the Maryland, Virginia and Washington DC region.  The event attracted law enforcement officers from agencies including Fairfax County, Loudoun County, Prince William County and Montgomery County, Md. Also on hand were the Marine Patrol, Air Assets and numerous volunteer SAR groups – including several K9 and equestrian teams that are long-time users of Mission Manager.

The organizers’ primary goal was to bring all search resources together and hone their collective skills in this multi-operational exercise involving multiple jurisdictions. At the same time, they wanted to see how Mission Manager performed compared to the traditional paper-based method of organizing and tracking search teams.

In this exciting competition, automation clearly won over paper, according to Andy Young, Mission Manager subject matter expert and a director of Parthenon Technology Consultants LLC, in Sterling, Va.

SAREX-NCR

Mission Manager’s mapping layers were used to plot the coordinates of the search area, and also track members, clues and events in real-time.

“Everyone we talked to – from the teams on the front lines to the search managers – gave Mission Manager a big thumbs up,” said Young. “They were particularly impressed with how it simplified the process of checking in-and-out members, performing accurate PAR [Personal Accountability Report] checks, organizing teams, and tracking all the search elements on mission maps.”

The mission was based on a scenario involving a mother and two sons who went missing while hiking in the park. The children’s father searches for them in the woods late at night, and also finds himself lost. Then, an 80-year-old Alzheimer’s patient self-deploys after learning of the incident on TV, and becomes lost herself.

The idea was to see how Mission Manager and search managers performed without any pre-planning.  Prior to the mission, they were given a GPS coordinate of the command post and a flyer describing the training goals and resource types.

The paper-based crew coordinated the mission inside a huge command vehicle and a communications truck, which were parked about 30 feet apart.  Andy Young and his crew sat at a table just outside the command bus, running Mission Manager on his laptop. A second computer was set up inside the command bus for the planning section, and a third in the communications truck for operations.

Moving between the three stations, he demonstrated how easy it was to check-in the participants, set up team assignments and run the mission in the field with a click of a button.  Meanwhile, the paper-based crew scrambled to write all the information on paper – running back-and-forth between the trailers to share information.

Andy Young

Andy Young is pictured outside the command vehicle as he demonstrates the power of Mission Manager.

“Mission Manager automated the entire process,” he said. “Setting up the team assignments was incredibly fast.”

The mission began with a hasty search – a quick search with K9 teams mostly on defined trails – then transitioned into a wide area search that spanned 5 square miles.  The U.S. National Grid (USNG), which is the standard geo-referencing tool for land SAR missions, was used to track and pinpoint the location of the subjects.

Mission Manager’s mapping layers, including USNG and U.S. Geological Survey Topo Maps, were used to define all the search areas. Mission Manager also tracked and recorded all events from the radio logs, including the participants’ actions, locations and clues found (such as candy, a black jacket and lunch leftovers.)  With geo-location codes, all this information appeared instantly on the mission maps.

“People were particularly impressed with the COMMS log [radio log] because it told the entire story,” Young said, noting that the recorded information also simplified the process of producing after action reviews.

Comms Log

The COMMs log tracked all events in real-time at the exercise, including clues found during the search.

During the exercise, three of the four missing family members were found alive and well; one of the sons had drowned in the river. With the help of air assets, the search parties also found the Alzheimer’s patient who was equipped with Project LifeSaver receivers/transmitters.

Fortunately, all these victims were role-players. But as it turned out, the training exercise evolved into a real-world SAR mission. Search teams involved in the exercise also found real people who were lost in the area.

“It was an exhilarating, rewarding experience to take part in this exercise,” said Young. “It was also a ground-breaking event for agencies and volunteers in the National Capitol Region, who gained the skills and knowledge that will help ensure well-coordinated search efforts in the future.”

For more details about the event, read article that appeared in WTOP – Washington’s Top News – by Mike Murillo: “Fairfax search drill hopes to better prepare officials.”

 ABOUT MISSION MANAGER
Mission Manager provides cloud-based software designed to help save lives and property by enabling first responders to operate more efficiently and effectively. Mission Manager’s team member and asset management capabilities, combined with its calendar and communication functions, allows users to enhance team readiness through optimized training and seamlessly integrate mission-specific operations during real-time events. Over the past three years, Mission Manager has supported approximately 6,000 actual missions ranging from single-person rescues to large public events and full-scale natural disaster response. Mission Manager is currently used in all 50 U.S. states, and on every continent except Antarctica. Truly a global tool, Mission Manager is available in 80 languages.

SAREX-NCR

SAREX reports

Mission Manager to Present Virtual “Lost Person” Exercise at SAREX 2015 – California’s Premier Search-and-Rescue Training Event in the High Sierras; Live Demos Also Showcased at Company’s Booth

Mission Manager experts will demonstrate how its cloud-based incident command software can help first responders locate lost-and-missing persons during a virtual training exercise at SAREX 2015 – California’s premier Search-and-Rescue (SAR) training event sponsored by the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, or Cal OES, and Amador County Sheriff’s Department. Mission Manager will also provide hands-on demos at its booth during the event, which runs Sept. 11-13 at the Plasse’s Resort at Silver Lake, located in the High Sierras.

The desktop exercise is scheduled Saturday, Sept. 12, from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. in Tent 6 at the remote resort.  It will simulate a mock lost person incident along the Carson River Emigrant Trail, a historic site that was used by Mormon pioneers beginning in 1848. The class will be facilitated by Eric Hanigan and Chris Stevens, Mission Manager technical experts who are also SAR first responders.

The scenario will tap into Mission Manager’s robust mapping and communications tools to locate the person who went missing along the trail. Participants can follow clues, such as footprints, to track the person to his campfire.  To see an overview of the topics to be covered, download the PDF presentation.

Based on Preparation, Readiness and Execution, Mission Manager uniquely provides an operational environment for daily team management and also serves as an online command center. In the field, Mission Manager provides a common operational picture for members in multiple locations using multiple devices.  After the incident, administrators can produce instant reports with analytics needed for legal compliance, debriefs and reimbursements.

To learn more about Mission Manager, see our 3-minute narrated video. Or visit our YouTube Channel to see our full line of videos, including instructional training videos.

 SAREX Poster