The ubiquitous use of mobile devices and smartphones in the United States presents an interesting opportunity for application developers with respect to emergency management. Software engineers from the federal government to individuals have recognized the unique prospect of utilizing always-connected devices to assist in emergency notification, preparedness, and response. The federal government has instituted and ratified multiple acts and mandates with respect to mobile communications during a crisis such as the Commercial Mobile Alert System. Likewise, individual organizations and developers have created mobile applications that access weather alerts from the National Weather Service. Many of these applications utilize push notification architectures to notify users and stakeholders about impeding emergency situations. While most of these applications are geared towards a national audience, there are a few that are highly granular with a focus on the local community. This thesis presents a universal iOS application running on all iOS mobile devices: iPhone, iPad, iPad Mini, and iPod Touch for the Virginia Tech community. The application is highly granular with respect to emergency response guidance and notification by providing clear, concise, and supportive information to citizens during a crisis. Additionally, the application provides another medium of delivery for the Office of Emergency Management at Virginia Tech to potentially mitigate the extent of collateral damage and secondary incidents while saving lives. / Master of Science

Disasters (e.g. earthquakes) and emergencies (e.g. fire) threaten the safety of occupants in the buildings and cause injuries and mortalities. These harmful effects are even more dangerous when secondary hazards (e.g. post-earthquake fires) emerge and it is commonly observed that the disasters/emergencies trigger secondary hazards.An effective indoor emergency guidance and navigation approach for occupants and first responders can decrease the number of injuries and mortalities during building emergencies by improving the evacuation process and response operations. For this reason, this research will propose a model-based guidance and vulnerability assessment approach for facilities that are under the threat of multi-hazard emergencies. The approach can be used to guide occupants from the facility affected by disasters/emergencies to safer zones and to direct the first responders by supplying them necessary building related information such as identified vulnerable locations in the indoor environments. An integrated utilization of Building Information Modeling tools, sensors, shortest path algorithms, and vulnerability assessment algorithms is proposed for the system in this research. The research steps of this thesis include (1) determination of requirements of an indoor navigation during emergency response and disaster management,(2) review, comparison, and evaluation of shortest path algorithms from an emergency response and disaster management point of view, (3) proposing a vulnerability assessment approach, and (4) proposing a real-time indoor emergency guidance and navigation system framework for buildings under the threat of multi-hazard emergencies. The findings of the research can be used in future studies on emergency response and disaster management domains.