Emergency communication and system design: The case of Indian Ocean Tsunami

On December 26th, 2004, the largest natural disaster in recent recorded history took the lives of over 225,000 people from over 40 different nations and displaced millions more. In an increasingly global environment, these disasters are no longer isolated phenomena and must be responded to with a global perspective. The number of casualties from Indian Ocean Tsunami is a testament to the failure of humans in mitigating large scale emergency incidents and it is the consequence of ineffective information sharing and communication among key stakeholders. Using Activity Theory as the theoretical lens, we explore the communication phenomena in emergency response and we identify the major challenge facing communication practices. The paper further explores the design, implementation, and management of advanced information technologies to address the communication challenges.