Gallatin County Emergency Management New Disaster Welfare Inquiry Tool [VIDEO]

Introducing Safety Check from Facebook on Vimeo.

With smartphones everywhere and most loaded with the Facebook app, here's an feature I hope to never use.

From Gallatin County Emergency Management:

Facebook recently released Safety Check to help obtain the status of those in the area of large disasters.  Sharing the status of those affected by disasters is often a frustrating experience for those affected as well as their family and friends trying to find out if they are ok.  The process of helping people find out the status of loved ones in the affected disaster area is typically referred to as Disaster Welfare Inquiries and is often challenging due to people being displaced and communication systems being overloaded.

Safety Check automatically opens a message in Facebook for those in the affected area of a disaster asking if they are ok.  The user can then select a couple options such as “I’m Safe or I’m Not in the Area.”  After selecting an option their selection is posted to their Facebook Timeline as a special post for their friends to see.  Facebook users are recommended to become familiar with this feature so they recognize it in the case they, or a family member, uses is someday.  While not a perfect solution, this provides another tool for those in disasters to communicate with their family quickly and effectively.