The iMARS vision aims to revolutionize emergency services by harnessing AI, robotics, IoT, and cross-disciplinary expertise. This research program facilitates collaboration among three first responders, an industrial SME, and four research institutions, fostering the exchange of knowledge and personnel across sectors and borders. Its core impact lies in promoting a holistic problem-solving approach and practical innovation in emergency response through: 1. Multidisciplinary Collaboration: Leveraging diverse fields to create solutions surpassing the limitations of individual disciplines. 2. Knowledge Exchange and Mobility: Offering secondments to blend academic and industrial insights, ensuring real-world applicability of research. 3. Professional Development: Providing training to develop a skilled workforce ready to deploy advanced technologies in emergencies. 4. Creativity and Entrepreneurship: Cultivating an environment where innovation flourishes, potentially sparking new ventures focused on emergency services. 5. Sector Interaction: Ensuring direct involvement of end-users, from first responders to industry experts, guarantees that developments are user-centric and actionable. 6. Technological Advancements: iMARS addresses the full technology spectrum, from data acquisition to advanced communication, aiming for comprehensive enhancements in emergency operations. 7. Humanitarian Focus: Prioritizing the use of robotics in search and rescue to improve outcomes for society reflects the project’s commitment to humanitarian values. iMARS stands to redefine emergency service provision, making it more robust and efficient. By aligning cutting-edge technology with strategic collaboration, iMARS sets the stage for global advancements in emergency management and could become a benchmark for international cooperative innovation.

Apart from earthquakes that usually result to catastrophic structural collapses, with many people entrapped or killed (e.g. Indonesia 2018, Japan 2011, Haiti 2010, Italy 2009, Greece 1999), there are also other causes that may result into a building’s collapse, such as an accidental explosion or a terrorist attack (e.g. 9/11) in public areas or critical infrastructures (airports etc.). Moreover, natural disasters like earthquakes may trigger technological disasters, such as industrial chemical release or even fires; this dynamic or “domino effect”, as it is called may pose tremendous risks to the countries and communities and hence it is a great challenge to cope with by the first responders and relevant organizations of civil protection. First responders and rescuers need specialized instrumentations, available to all times, easily accessible that meet stringent requirements in terms of detection accuracy, quick localization, and reduction of false alarms. The S&R project will design, implement and test through a series of large scale pilot scenarios a highly interoperable, modular open architecture platform for first responders’ capitalising on expertise and technological infrastructure from both COncORDE and IMPRESS FP7 projects. The governance model of S&R will be designed to operate more effectively and its architectural structure will allow to easily incorporate next generation R&D and COTS solutions which will be possibly adopted in the future disaster management systems. The Model will also support a unified vision of the EU role and will provide a common framework to assess needs and integrate responses. The framework will enable supportive approach using a wider range of decisional support features and monitoring systems and will also give to first responders an effective and unified vision of (a) the dynamic changes going on during event’s lifetime and (b) the capabilities and resources currently deployed in the field.

Considering the socio-ecological transition of Europe 2030, and towards a more resilient and informed community, focusing on the forests that are near wildfire risk, TREEADS aims to build upon state-of-the-art high TRL products and unite them in a holistic Fire Management platform that optimize and reuse per phase the available Socio-technological Resources in all three main phases of Wildfires. For the prevention and preparedness TREEADS propose the use of a real-time risk evaluation tool that can receive multiple classification inputs and work with a new proposed neural network-powered Risk factor indicator. To create a model of Fire adapted communities (FAC) in parallel to insurance incentives, TREEADS will use alkali activated construction materials (AAM) integrating post-wildfires wood ashes (PWA) for fire-resilient buildings and infrastructure. TREEADS also uses a variety of technological solutions such as the Copernicus infrastructure, and a swarm of small drones customized for accurate forest supervision. In the area of Detection TREEADS propose a variety of toolsets that will accommodate most needs. Stemming from Virtual reality for the training, wearables for the protective equipment of the emergency responders. to UAV (drones), UAG and airships for improving capacity in temporal and spatial analysis as well as to increase the inspected area coverage. Last, TREEADS will build a new land and field-based restoration initiative that will use all modern techniques such as agroforestry, drones for seed spread, Internet of things sensors that will be able to adapt the seeding process based on the ground needs and on the same time with the help of AI to determine post-fire risks factors. TREEADS solution will be demonstrated and validated under real operating conditions. Demonstration will involve Eight complex pilot implementations executed in seven EU countries and in Taiwan.

The subject of the Project:Determination of disaster and emergency (earthquake, fire and flood) response and evacuation methods for individuals who live depended to medical devices. Determination of measures to be taken against disaster risks in existing living areas and post-disaster temporary shelter standards.Target Audience of the Project:The main target group of the project is disaster and emergency response and evacuation personnel. In addition, the families of the individuals in question, as well as the personnel working on the housing of the victims after disasters, are among the target groups.The project aims to achieve the following objectives:- To increase the professional knowledge and skills of disaster and emergency response and evacuation personnel.- Taking the necessary precautions against the disaster and emergency risks in the living spaces of the individuals who live depended to medical devices and making them safe.- Determining the accommodation standards that these individuals can safely and healthily live after disasters and emergencies.Project Partnership:The project partnership was created by bringing together organizations that have different expertise in disaster and emergency situations, muscle diseases NGOs, distance education, medicine, disability, design, education, risk management and innovation.1- Eskişehir AFAD is a public institution experienced in disaster awareness training, the response in disaster and emergency, evacuation and the establishment of shelter areas.2- Osmangazi University (Training and Research Hospital) has experience in neurology and muscle diseases. Osmangazi University (Distance Education Application and Research Center) is experienced in distance education and producing innovative digital education contents.3- Association for Combating SMA Disease is an NGO experienced in ensuring the active participation of individuals with SMA in the community life and supporting all kinds of activities that will benefit the patients.4- PUI is an NGO experienced in responding to natural or human disasters and providing assistance to disaster victims.5- AIJU specializes in e-learning, data mining, cloud computing, augmented reality, 3D and virtual reality on various platforms.6- The Latvian Umbrella Body For Disability Organization (SUSTENTO) is an umbrella organization that includes more than 50.000 disabled or chronic diseases in 54 different member organizations in Latvia.Project Outputs;1- Distance Education Portal containing educational videos, animations and digital books produced by determining disaster and emergency response techniques and evacuation methods for individuals who continue their lives depending on medical devices (O1). In addition, the portal will contain training content on measures to be taken against disaster risks in current living areas and content on post-disaster temporary shelter standards.2- Training material to be produced with methods such as animation and 3D, which disaster and emergency response personnel can learn about the importance, priority and technical features of the medical devices which individuals living in depended to medical devices are connected. (O2)Project activities:Preparation, implementation and dissemination will be done in the following ways.Preparation Process;1. Working meetings with relevant organizations and associated partners (universities, NGOs related to muscle diseases, etc.).2. Home visits for the purpose of recognizing the living spaces of the individuals who live depended to medical devices and learning about the devices.3. Meeting with doctors and academicians working in health facilities for these individuals.4. Literature review and data collection.The implementation process;1. Transnational Project Kick-Off Meeting and Project Launch.- Project management, distribution of tasks between partners, time and financial management etc. administrative issues.2. Vocational Education and Training activity (Short-term personal mobility, Learning, Teaching, Training Activities)- Target; Sharing knowledge, experience, good practices and technical knowledge for the production of intellectual products.3. Output development processDissemination Process;- Project Workshop as a Multiplier Event; Both the evaluation of the quality of the project outputs and the introduction of the project results.- To hold project promotion meetings with related institutions, to attend workshops, fairs and to open stands.- To increase the visibility in printed, visual and social media and to prepare promotional brochures about project activities and results.- To distribute digital outputs to the relevant institutions in written or digital format.- To prepare scientific articles about project activities and results.- To ensure that the project outputs and results affect the policies and programs to be developed in this regard through the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency.

Recent disaster events, like the 2021 flood in Germany showed clearly, that even the best alert systems and top first responder organisations can not prevent fatalities and serious damage on property without having prepared the citizens how to act and react during disaster situations and crises, understand alerts and follow instructions. B-Prepared offers a cost-effective solution for building a culture of disaster preparedness with a multi-actor approach in realistic historical scenarios. B-prepared builds on a freely accessible massive collaborative knowledge base and data hub, demonstrating its usefulness via three demonstrator applications: a cooperative multiplayer VR serious game, simulating real disaster scenarios for the safest near-real experience; an interactive gamified mobile app with age-appropriate content and enhanced accessibility to people with specific functional needs for the widest possible reach; and an LMS system to effectively and comparably measure preparedness levels achieved by VR and/or mobile users on a unified scale. Players can take different roles to solve puzzle tasks in an immersive experience. Teamplay, collaboration and communication are keys to survival, strengthening the culture of mutual assistance and cooperation in danger. Player behaviour and gameplay logged in a privacy-preserving way helps collect data on in-game behaviour which serves assessment of preparedness but will also be shared with other synergic research in the same field. A large-scale virtual reality hackathon series will demonstrate its features. The open beta will be publicly available as a giveaway, inviting stakeholders via direct outreach. After closing beta, the game will be available in a non-profit freemium model where in-game purchases are replaced by in-game donations for relief organizations, with a small percentage kept for maintenance and further development.