SARA (Search And Rescue Application)

SARA (Search And Rescue Application)

The SARA application is a crisis management system developed by Christian Michelsen Research (CMR). In 2019 CMR became part of NORCE, and snce then the application is maintained and further developed by NORCE.

SARA has been in use in the Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centres (JRCC) on Sola and in Bodø as a support and logging system since January 2000. When hikers are missing or caught in landslides, when boats catch fire or run aground, when sick cruise passengers must be taken to hospital or an ATV accident occurs, JRCC coordinates the search and rescue operations. JRCC registers over 8,000 such emergencies per year in SARA.

Resources from government agencies, voluntary organisations, and private businesses, such as police, ambulance, rescue helicopter and the Red Cross, can be found by searching from SARA in The Shared Resources Register.

The positions of the incidents and of available and involved resources are marked on the SARA map, together with, for example, a defined search area. SARA integrates with many third party systems. Weather data is obtained from the Norwegian Meteorological Institute and shown on the map. AIS data (boat positions) are continuously streamed from the Norwegian Coastal Administration and displayed on the map using the application TrackServer, which was also developed by CMR/NORCE. Search in The Norwegian Place Name Register, at The Norwegian Mapping Authority, is used to find address information.

An adapted version of SARA has been used by the Norwegian Coastal Radio Stations since 2004. Radio Medico (the Norwegian Centre for Maritime and Diving Medicine) has also used an adapted version of SARA since 2014.

SARA is written in Java and is based on standards such as HTTPS, LDAP, JMS, JDBC. All information is distributed to the server(s) and other users so that everyone always has the same information available, whether they are working with the same or separate events.