Google updates maps to display natural disasters

Google is improving its SOS alerts by adding visual information about natural disasters and a navigation system on Google Maps. Google says the upgrade will extend the capabilities of the SOS alerts to provide crisis information via relevant news stories and Twitter updates from local authorities to include detailed visualisations about hurricanes, earthquakes and floods. In the days leading up to a hurricane, users will receive a crisis notification card on Google Maps that appears near impacted areas.
July 2, 2019 Read time: 2 mins

1691 Google is improving its SOS alerts by adding visual information about natural disasters and a navigation system on Google Maps.

Google says the upgrade will extend the capabilities of the SOS alerts to provide crisis information via relevant news stories and 2171 Twitter updates from local authorities to include detailed visualisations about hurricanes, earthquakes and floods.

In the days leading up to a hurricane, users will receive a crisis notification card on Google Maps that appears near impacted areas. A forecast cone shows the prediction of the storm’s trajectory along with information about what time it is likely to hit certain areas, the company adds.

The crisis card is also expected to display a visualisation of an earthquake’s magnitude along with colour coding to indicate the intensity of shaking in surrounding areas.

According to Google, users in India will be able to see forecasts of where flooding is likely to occur in addition to the expected severity in different areas.

This summer Google intends to offer another alert which informs people of routes which may be affected by crisis activity.

Urban Traffic Control

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Russia looks to ITS to curb congestion and reduce accidents
    May 7, 2015
    Major ITS installations are planned as the Russian capital Moscow grapples with extensive traffic problems. At the end of 2014, Russia’s first complex intelligent transport system (ITS) started easing traffic problems in and around the capital Moscow, following the implementation of the plans by the federal government and the city’s authorities.
    Read More
  • Aimsun makes Paris match
    March 11, 2021
    How do digital twins allow city planners to test out new road layouts virtually?
    Read More
  • Can GNSS solve the tolling world’s woes?
    December 5, 2013
    Kapsch’s Arno Klamminger and Wolfgang Fleischer consider the need for an agnostic approach to technology for charging and tolling. Periodically, given the march of technology, it is worth pausing and taking stock of where we have got to and where we go next. Such reflections are necessary if we are to take full advantage of what we have at our disposal and, potentially, avoid decisions which push us down technological culs de sac. A look at the use of Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-based technol
    Read More
  • Vehicular networking architecture for local road weather services
    August 19, 2015
    The Finnish Meteorological Institute is currently testing two-way delivery of local weather data as Timo Sukuvaara explains. Road weather information is one of the key ways in which ITS can help reduce traffic accidents and fatalities – which is why the Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) has long provided road weather services. Now, the CoMoSeF (Cooperative Mobility Services of the Future) project has been developing communication methodologies to deliver road weather services directly to vehicles and g
    Read More

Highlighted Content