This article is intended to supplement and
(not replace) the following articles with best
practices and tips to improve upon your
incident mapping:
Starting June of 2020, Intterra is rolling out new Incident Mapping capabilities client by client. The focus is improved data compatibility, simplified workflows, addition incident types and mapping features, and improved labeling and attachments. Also check out Mapping wildfires using to the new Incident Mapping layers.
Overview
Viewing current incident mapping in one
place is an important component for
providing a common
operational picture. For most
clients, initial incident locations
auto-populate on the map using a CAD feed
for metro agencies, Active Incidents
(IRWIN) for wildfire agencies, or other
custom sources. Likewise,
incident manage team mapping of large
wildfire fires can be viewed using the
Active Incident Mapping layer provided
from the National Incident Feature Service
(NIFS),
The Intterra incident mapping described in this article provide users the ability to add and share near-real-time mapping for initial attack and emerging wildfires, as well as all hazard incidents that that are outside the scope of the NIFS.
The incident mapping workflow
is simply -
- Add the incident icon first, provide
an incident name, and save.
- Add additional features, such as a
fire perimeter, staging areas,
division assignments, evacuation
areas, etc, making sure to associate
each feature with the incident.
- Share your incident mapping with an
incident management team and others as
needed.
- Keep Intterra Incident Mapping clean
and current.
Details
1) Add the Incident Icon First
Any incident mapping in Intterra should begin
with adding an incident icon (to establish the
incident name), and then flow to feature
mapping. As many as a dozen tools and
reports rely on having incident features
correctly associated to the indent name
(including Briefing Mode). In addition,
associating an Intterra wildfire incident with
the matching Active Incidents (IRWIN) incident when they exist, will auto-fill the
Incident ID and help reduce redundancy in the
wildfire reports.
Following these steps will assure that other
tools and reports in Intterra work as
expected:
- Add a manage
the incident icon or copy an existing
feature, such as an Active
Incidents (IRWIN), as an Intterra
incident.
- Override the auto-generated incident name
(userid @ current date) by
highlighting it and typing the incident
place name. Use the IRWIN name, when
available.
- When adding additional map features to the
incident, be sure to select and associate
the best incident name from the dropdown
menu. The globe icon is there to
let you know other options are
available.
NOTE: If IRWIN data is updated
after map features are added (for example,
a fire starts and is mapped prior to data
flowing through IRWIN), someone on your
team should eventually edit the fire and
its features to associate it with the
official Active Incidents
(IRWIN) fire using the
auto-fill pull-down.
NOTE: This video is a bit dated in UI, but the process is the same.
2) Add additional features
Once the incident icon is created,
start mapping the incident. The
complexity of the mapping is up to agency
policy and the needs of the incident and
ranges from simply adding a rough immediate
wildfire perimeter and perhaps an evacuation
area to mapping needed to for an incident
action plan with division assignments, staging
areas, and all hazard mapping.
While the complexity of mapping
varies, the process is the same -
- Add the feature,
then
- Edit the incident name field and
select the the proper incident to
associate it with.
Simplified and logical grouping of
the features provides a focused
workflow. Click Incident Mapping Symbols
Reference for a full list of
possible groupings and associated
symbols. Here is summary
of
- For all incident types: Incident
Information and Access, Critical
Infrastructure
- By Incident
Type: Wildfire, Natural
Hazard, Hazmat, Law and EMS,
SAR
- Assessments: Damage Assessments,
Structure Triage
TIP: Use the Label the Map feature (Information and Access
Features) to Add Text to Map. The Label
the Map feature can be used to
add important information to the map.
- This may be important for
informative notes associated with
a map feature, such as radio
channel assignments to a division,
landmarks to help users navigate,
etc., or
- Add information to a map feature
so users don't need to click to
view that information in the Info
Panel, such as the capacity of a
water source, safety area,
etc. The label field in the
incident features doesn't yet
display on the map (for GIS use
later).
NOTE: Labels do not display on
the Field Tool app.
3) Share Incident Mapping
Sharing FROM Intterra
As an incident escalates, it's
important to be able to share your 'Intterra'
mapping to the National Incident Feature
Service (NIFS) used by the IMT's GISS using a
process that saves time and minimizes
duplication of effort. Since the
Intterra and NIFS data schema are the same for
wildfire and triage, the incident's GISS
can simply copy the Intterra features
along with all the attributes and
attachments directly into the
NIFS
There are two ways to share data to
the GISS:
- Use the Layer Export
Tool to export of your data
for an area of interest. You can
email a link for the GISS to download the
data.
- Intterra can approve a GISS to access the
services directly into their ArcGIS Pro
session. Contact support@intterragroup.com for
details.
The same process can be used to
share other types of data from Intterra.
NOTE: On June 19, 2020, the
NIFS was moved to ArcGIS Online. The
ability to edit NIFS with in Intterra is no
longer available.
Share TO Intterra
There is a two step process to
adding mapping to Intterra:
- Use the Add Layer
Tool to add mapped feature to
a users local Intterra session (no one
else will see it). The referenced
article includes a list of compatible file
formats.
- Use Copy to the
Map to share with all
users. NOTE: Only the
geometry of the is copied.
Attributes will need to be filled in by
the user.
4) Keep Intterra Incident Mapping
Clean and Current
The list of Intterra incidents
can get stale over time and can
include incorrect or duplicate
incident names if users are not
careful to associate the name of
each feature to an incident.
It's a good practice for your
organization to have a process in
place for managing and deleting
(archiving) non-active
incidents. The Incidents
Tool allows users to
see and zoom to incident features
by name. Users with
management privileges can rename
and delete (archive) all features associated to an incident by selecting Manage
Incidents.
