Project Wildfire

Inspiration

The increasing frequency and severity of wildfires worldwide inspired me to create Project Wildfire, a smart evacuation app aimed at saving lives during these devastating events. The alarming statistics, such as the over 3,300 lives lost globally in the past three decades due to wildfires, highlighted the urgent need for an effective, real-time evacuation solution.

What it does

Project Wildfire is a smart evacuation app that helps users safely navigate during wildfires. It leverages real-time fire data from trusted sources like FIRMS and Google Map APIs to identify active fire spots. The app then calculates and provides optimized evacuation routes to the nearest safe houses, ensuring users can reach safety quickly and efficiently, even during times of panic and stress.

How we built it

Utilized the FIRMS API for real-time fire data and the Google Maps API for map integration. Pulled data on active fire spots and implemented a shortest path algorithm to guide users to safe houses. Adjusted path costs based on fire proximity and other factors, ensuring optimal routes. Built the user interface with React.js to display live data and evacuation paths in an intuitive format.

Challenges we ran into

Data Collection from the API: The real-time data wasn’t refreshing smoothly on the UI. We encountered issues with exceeding API call limits, which caused path calculations to fail due to continuous updates.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

The app has the potential to make a real-life impact by saving lives during wildfires. We’ve created a solution to address a critical, growing issue with wildfire safety and navigation.

What we learned

Real-time refreshing requires significant computing power, especially when pulling and processing data from APIs like FIRMS. We learned about API rate limits, particularly the challenge of exceeding 10,000 calls, which hindered seamless updates.

What's next for Project Wildfire

We plan to optimize the real-time data refreshing process, ensuring it doesn't overload the system or exceed API call limits. We'll enhance the user experience by improving path calculation speed and UI responsiveness.