Social Media is a Great Way to Communicate During Natural Disasters

If you're like me, having a Facebook account has definitely made it easier to keep in touch with family and friends around the world. But I never understood its usefulness in keeping people alive until last weekend when Typhoon "Ondoy" ripped through the Philippine Island of Luzon, flooding the capital and surrounding provinces. At last count, the death toll is almost 250 people and half a million people have been displaced.

For me, it all started when I saw the following Facebook post from a friend in Manila: "My car is ruined and the swimming pool in the ground floor of our building has disappeared! I also have refugees in the house. huwhoah!"

Now, flooding is nothing new in the Philippines. We're used to it, so I thought nothing of it. The rainy season runs from June to September, and it seemed typical weather to me. And while I saw a sporadic posting for emergency numbers, I still saw nothing that alarmed me. Then I saw a post from my cousin that absolutely freaked me out: "Anyone with a JETSKI or BOAT? My friends... need rescuing. Water's reached the second floor of their house. They live on..."

I quickly sent a message to my cousin making sure he was ok (he is), and it was like the floodgates opened over the next 48 hours. Constant postings from people who needed help, rescue and evacuation information, people who wanted to know if anyone had heard from so-and-so, pictures and videos of the devastation, and finally donation and assistance information. It was nonstop, and I quickly became addicted to my Facebook feed, checking for posts from family and friends indicating that they were safe.

In previous years, the devastation of a flood like this would have taken days to reach the rest of the world. I would have seen it on news feed crawls, and that would be about it. However, according The National, an English newspaper in the United Arab Emirates, social media outlets played a key role in disaster efforts when electricity and phone lines were cut.

Pleas for help and reports came from Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs, and texts. Volunteers and donation centers were mobilized in part due to the government's lack of preparedness for disaster response. Even in a poor country like the Philippines, the National quotes Tonyo Cruz, president of TXTPower, a consumer telecoms advocacy group, and an avid blogger, as estimating there are 10-15 million Filipinos using the Internet and that number is expected to grow. "Most people have mobile phones and this is the text capital of the world, so word spreads very quickly," he said.

From personal experience, I know this is true. In fact, most of my friends and family in the Philippines have two cell phones in order to receive cell service from the two major networks in the country. As crazy as it sounds, Filipinos' hunger for high-tech gadgets seems to have been their saving grace during this tragedy.

"I think we are seeing for the first time just what social networking can achieve in this country and it is amazing," said Mr. Cruz. "At first people were surprised at the suddenness of the storm but they soon became angry as the government was so slow to react. Instead, ordinary people took it into their own hands to do something."

And it worked. Even for Filipinos abroad, we tried to do our part by spreading the word about the condition in our homeland. Links to UNICEF and the Philippine Red Cross continues to spread from reposts on social media. In my experience, this has never happened so quickly before. And I think, how many people could have been saved after Hurricane Katrina if we had Facebook and Twitter for victims to communicate their whereabouts?

It seems disaster response groups here in the US are already aware of the impact social media has on natural disaster responsiveness. According to a September 1, 2009 news report on the website Breaking News 24//7, The Safe America Foundation says social media helps families stay in contact during times of disaster because "In an emergency traditional phone lines may be down and traditional methods of communication may not be working," said spokeswoman Carla Shaw. "We want people to rehearse what would you do, and what other forms of communication would you have at your disposal."

So they are spreading the word about social media and texting in the event that traditional means of communication fail. Social media does seem to have been helpful in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike and the Iowa floods earlier this year, as listed by the Vandiver Group Blog. And a blogger for givezooks.com tells the story of how Twitter was helpful in communicating the spread of the Santa Barbara wildfires in May 2009, as well as how the local Red Cross used Twitter to post information on evacuation shelters.

The blogger ends by saying, "A natural disaster such as this highlights the increased importance of Social Media Platforms in our society. Twitter and Facebook are not just for high school kids anymore. These platforms are becoming relevant and mainstream. As such, any responsible organization (nonprofit or otherwise) must incorporate these new media as part of an overall communication strategy in the very, very near future."

As someone who witnessed this firsthand during last week's flood in the Philippines, I can only say that I am now a believer. Because of Facebook, I can breathe easy that my family and my friends are safe. And because of Facebook, I can do my part to spread the word and provide assistance.

If you would like to donate to the victims of Typhoon Ondoy, please visit UNICEF or the Philippine Red Cross. For a conversion calculator of US Dollars to Philippine pesos, please click this link on Yahoo! Finance.

Sources:

Contacts on www.Facebook.com. Thanks to all who posted the information and donation information online.

Karl Wilson, "Deluged Filipinos send out digital SOS", The National, http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090930/FOREIGN/709299890/1002

Natasha Metzler, "Social media, text messaging could help families communicate in disasters, safety group says", Breaking News 24/7http://blog.taragana.com/n/social-media-text-messaging-could-help-families-communicate-in-disasters-safety-group-says-156438/

Eileen Buleza, "Social Media & Natural Disasters", Vandivergroup.comhttp://www.vandivergroup.com/blog/2008/09/17/social-media-natural-disasters/

Givezooks.com, "Natural Disasters and Social Media", http://blog.givezooks.com/?p=86

Unicef, "Help Children Affected by the Philippines Floods, https://secure.unicefusa.org/site/Donation2?df_id=5960&5960.donation=form1

Philippine Red Cross, "Online Donations", http://www.redcross.org.ph/Site/PNRC/Default.aspx?S=48&SS=972

Yahoo! Finance, "Currencies Center", http://finance.yahoo.com/currency-converter#from=USD;to=PHP;amt=1