Case Study: Victoria Police achieves rapid, real-time bushfire damage assessments with Trimble Juno SC handhelds

Real-time GPS Mapping and GIS Solution Aids Efficient Disaster Management

Victoria Police (VicPol) faced the aftermath of the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires, which destroyed towns and overwhelmed traditional paper-based damage assessment methods. With landmarks gone and missing-person counts rising, they needed a faster, more accurate way to locate, record and coordinate searches across devastated areas.

Working with the MAPS team, ESRI, Maptel and Trimble, VicPol deployed Trimble Juno SC handhelds running ArcPad with a custom app and built-in 3.5G modems to capture parcel-linked assessments and transmit updates in real time to the GIS server. The solution cut assessment time to one third of the paper-based method and enabled teams to search 5,781 properties, perform 3,352 searches, take 9,600 georeferenced photos and send 1,539 geo-referenced records reliably.

Victoria Police

Greg Barras

Acting Senior Sergeant