Cobra Gold Exercise Extended Use of AtHoc IWSAlerts for Myanmar Relief Efforts.
Burlingame, CA (PRWEB) August 18, 2008 -- AtHoc, Inc., the pioneer and leader in network-centric emergency notification systems, today announced U.S. Pacific forces successfully fielded AtHoc IWSAlerts㤠during the Cobra Gold 2008 exercise in Thailand and rated the solution as a "Positive Military Utility." In addition to successfully completing the exercise, joint military forces also used AtHoc IWSAlerts in preparation for relief efforts when Cyclone Nargis struck Myanmar, Burma in May.
Cobra Gold 2008 was a six week event that took place in April and May of this year. The exercise was designed to improve military readiness and interoperability between the U.S., Thai, Japanese, Indonesian and Singaporean militaries. The exercise demonstrated the United State's support for the security and safety of Pacific allies.
During the event, the five countries participated in field training exercises, humanitarian assistance exercises and computer-simulated command post exercises. During these exercises, AtHoc IWSAlerts was fielded as a solution for rapidly disseminating emergency information to personnel to warn of emergencies, provide instruction for action about how to respond and track recipients' responses to alerts.
For the exercise, AtHoc IWSAlerts was first deployed at the U.S. Pacific Command (USPACOM) headquarters at Camp Smith in Hawaii on the Asia Pacific Area Network (APAN). The U.S. Army Pacific (USARPAC) led the exercise and operators from the Joint Task Force protection teams throughout Thailand were able to use the emergency notification system. With onsite support by an AtHoc engineer, they were trained to publish alerts, create user and distribution lists, and disseminate alerts through the Web-based alerting interface. Alerts were sent mainly through mobile and landline phones and to computer desktops, but they could also be sent to any network-connected mobile device, siren or public address system.
Midway through the exercise, disaster struck in Myanmar in the form of Cyclone Nargis, and many of the Cobra Gold participants were diverted from the exercise to help respond to the cyclone. In preparation for the relief efforts, AtHoc IWSAlerts was used in real-world scenarios to alert personnel about emergency situations.
"AtHoc IWSAlerts proved itself to the Cobra Gold forces and demonstrated effectiveness when it counted most - in supporting real-world disaster relief efforts," said Andy Anderson, vice president of defense sector operations for AtHoc. "Cobra Gold tests the viability of products for use in the Pacific region - tests that help ensure that the technologies used are as ready for action as the men and women who serve. AtHoc IWSAlerts demonstrated the value of network-centric alerting in simulations as well as through its use in Myanmar, meeting the Pacific force's high standards to achieve Positive Military Utility status."
USARPAC and PACOM rated AtHoc IWSAlerts based on its scores for performance, operator feedback, ease of use, maintenance requirements, deployment flexibility and cost benefit analysis.
AtHoc IWSAlerts has been deployed at PACOM headquarters at Camp Smith for over a year on the NMCI network. It is used for emergency notification and critical alerting to all headquarters personnel.
About AtHoc
AtHoc is the pioneer and recognized leader in providing enterprise-class, network-centric emergency notification systems to military, government and commercial organizations for physical security, force protection and personnel accountability. Millions of end users worldwide, in organizations such as the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Navy, Hawaii State Civil Defense, NASA, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Boeing, PricewaterhouseCoopers and eBay, rely on AtHoc's unified management systems for their emergency alerting and critical communication needs. AtHoc has partnered with market leaders including Microsoft, Cisco, Harris, Siemens, Avaya, Lockheed Martin, Unisys and others to bring these notification solutions to the public and commercial markets.
For more information on AtHoc, please visit http://www.athoc.com.
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