Case Study: American Red Cross achieves faster, more secure crisis communications and coordinated emergency response with BlackBerry AtHoc

How The American Red Cross is Using a Crisis Communications Technology Tool to Enhance its Humanitarian Mission

The American Red Cross, a U.S. humanitarian non-profit reaching about 36,000 volunteers and staff, faced the constant challenge of coordinating large, fast-moving disaster responses—most acutely during events like Hurricane Dorian. The organization needed a secure, flexible crisis-communications system that could quickly reach and account for dispersed responders, protect sensitive data, and keep volunteers safe while enabling rapid coordination with partners and communities.

The Red Cross adopted BlackBerry AtHoc, a multi-channel alerting platform with message and response tracking, staff accountability, and easy deployment. AtHoc is used for arrival instructions, safety alerts, workforce surveys and coordination calls, supporting roughly 20,000 deployments a year and generating 2,000+ alerts and 100,000+ unique messages annually across ~36,000 users. The result: faster, safer responses, stronger partner coordination and trust, and a scalable solution the Red Cross is expanding both internally and internationally.

American Red Cross

Brad Kieserman

Vice President of Disaster Operations and Logistics