The challenge

For the Fire Region of Antwerp, a Belgian city fire department, the officers and firefighters engaged in actively addressing an emergency - both in the crisis room and onsite - needed to be able to quickly access, distribute, and share detailed information. During an emergency, it wasn’t practical for firefighters onsite to be accessing files on laptops. And back in the crisis room, setting up the files and folders took valuable time during the most critical part of the intervention. So the department needed a solution that allowed personnel in the crisis room to quickly set up files, and firefighters onsite to access them on mobile devices.

The solution

The fire department chose Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Forms to manage the flow of information at emergencies. Now when an emergency arises, officers in the crisis room quickly set up shared folders and files with Apps Script and Drive. The script creates documents and spreadsheets automatically within the folders, with files such as contact sheets and logs to document events. It also adds the intervention name and date to each file, and emails a folder link to the team.

Onsite, firefighters use their mobile devices to access the folders and make edits, recording the details of the emergency and their response to it. As additional details are added, everyone on the team can see who has added which details. At the end of the intervention, the team uses Forms to collect feedback from neighbors and witnesses at the scene.