HHS selects challenge winners for Facebook app

Three Facebook applications designed to help people prepare for emergencies and get support from friends and family in an emergency – from personal medical emergencies or car accidents to natural or man-made disasters – are winners of a Facebook application challenge sponsored by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response (ASPR).

ASPR’s Facebook Lifeline Application Challenge called on software application developers to design new Facebook applications that could enhance individual and community resilience by establishing social connections in advance of an emergency. Two recent Brown University graduates, Evan Donahue and Erik Stayton, partnered as Team ALP to win first place with their application, named Lifeline. The Las Vegas team JAMAJIC 360 with David Vinson, Erick Rodriguez, Gregg Orr, and Garth Winckler came in second with an app also named JAMAJIC 360. Third place was awarded to AreYouOk? developed by TrueTeamEffort, a team of 11 University of Illinois students led by Alex Kirlik. Although these top three applications differ in how users interface with the app, all three allow users to designate three lifelines -- Facebook friends the person can count on and who agree to check on them in an emergency, supply them with shelter, food, and other necessities, and provide the person’s social network with an update about their wellbeing. Facebook users could use the lifeline app to create disaster readiness plans and share the plans with their emergency contacts, and provide users with news. In addition, the first place app allows Facebook friends to collaborate on tracking the user’s status in a disaster-affected area so these friends can easily find the user’s lifelines and contact them to report that the user is safe or if the user appears to be missing. This networked approach increases the efficiency of finding missing users. The app allows users to print cards with a snapshot of their preparedness plan to carry in their wallets.