Wildfires are a widespread and complex issue that pose unique and constantly evolving risks. For the Mindshifts on Megafires design challenge, I worked with a team to design a way to better communicate the risks of wildfires to those affected before, during, and/or after the event. We interviewed UCSD students and professional stakeholders that work to map wildfires in order to understand the risks wildfires pose to the public and what information the public needs to adequately protect themselves.
I worked with a team of four to create this design as part of the Mindshifts on Megafires designathon hosted by UCSD's Design Lab and Supercomputer Center.
For this design challenge, our team was tasked with designing a more effective way to communicate the dynamic and evolving risks about wildfires to the people who need to understand and respond to them — residents, first responders, elected officials, and others — before, during, and after a wildfire event. We learned about pre-existing tools and information (such as extreme weather maps, Firemap, Watch Duty, fire maps) that serve to inform the public about wildfire activity. We also interviewed professionals who map wildfires for a living as well as regular people who had experienced wildfires firsthand. This led us to focus on young adults apathetic towards the dangers of wildfires, since we had a compelling firsthand account from a college student who was in a high-risk zone for a wildfire in 2025 but didn't feel an urgent need to evacuate, despite instructions to do so. Our goal was to come up with a solution that made more information about the risks of wildfires easily available to people, with the hope that they would understand the risks better and be compelled to take action.
Because young adults are familiar with scrolling short-form videos on social media, we expanded upon existing emergency alerts to include not only text, but live videos and trusted speakers, to provide more information and spur the audience to listen to local authorities about the urgent risks that wildfires pose.
Young adults who are apathetic towards the dangers wildfires pose to them. They do not prioritize preparing for emergencies or evacuation unless it feels immediate or personally relevant, posing a risk to themselves and others.
We redesigned existing emergency alerts to create Advanced Emergency Alert (AEA). AEA builds upon the existing emergency alert infrastructure that notifies people’s phones when there is a disaster, such as a wildfire, with a short form video format. AEA grabs the attention of young adults so that even the most apathetic will feel the gravity of the situation and feel empowered to take action (by evacuating or preparing to). AEA functions the same way as existing emergency systems but with a key difference: an audio notification with brief, spoken instructions pops up automatically if a person located in an evacuation or at-risk area while providing informative videos. The user first sees a brief clip from a non-partisan authority, like a firefighter on the scene, notifying people the situation at hand. The screen then auto-scrolls to a real-time map of affected areas with the person’s live location used as reference. Finally, the interface displays clear evacuation instructions, including what direction and roads to take to avoid the fire and get to safety. Utilizing visuals, maps, and trustworthy speakers reduces potential misinterpretations and lets the user know exactly where the fire is, allowing them to feel knowledgeable and in control. Since the visuals go beyond mere text, even young adults who would normally disregard an alert would experience the gravity of the situation and feel empowered and informed to take action to evacuate.
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Take a look at our poster! ⬇️
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https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nZ26sshpYibOPRF_45bnD2Piz_9Q4L_r/view?usp=sharing
At the beginning of the designathon, we were given the design challenge along with some preliminary information abuot how wildfires are mapped, services that already exist to inform the public about wildfires, and data about wildfires and their risks. We did some initial ideation to identify what we knew, what we thought we knew, and what we didn't know, risks before, during, and after a wildfire, as well as primary, secondary, and tertiary user groups.
What we knew
What we thought we knew
What we didn’t know
Risks
Before
During
After