Semantic Ontology Design for a Multi-Cooperative First Responder Interoperable Platform

Natural and man-made catastrophic events appear be steadily increasing in intensity and frequency. Proper preparation, response and recovery are essential if mankind and its vital systems are to cope with and survive large-scale disasters. The organisations responsible for delivering emergency response services often under-perform due to a lack of proper interoperation and collaboration. This paper discuss the interoperability issues for data interchange among first responders agency participating in emergency situation and provides exhaustive overview of the recent studies and attempts to solve the problem. The approach taken by the EU funded REDIRNET project for development of a core ontology enabling exchange of data among first responder agencies is presented. The novelty included in the ontology tree is described and the implementation in the meta-data gateway is introduced. The paper provides insight in the implementation of the REDIRNET platform and the designed semantic interoperable services. The paper ends with the discussion of the presented work and the concluding remarks