Innovative Disaster Debris Management: HaulPassTM-Electronic Debris Management System

The 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons inflicted tremendous damage throughout the southern United States. After many years of below normal storm seasons, the most recent two storm seasons brought with them record numbers of storms and the most costly natural disaster in our country's history. Hurricanes are not the only reasons Disaster Debris Management is implemented. Recent world catastrophes, both by nature and man, such as the 2005 Tsunami that ravaged Indonesia, terrorist attacks in New York and Washington D.C., earthquakes in South America, and random blizzards in Buffalo, NY in 2006 exposed a weakness in accurate data collection during disasters. The authors of this paper have personally been involved in disaster remediation for the past seven years focused primarily on debris management activities. In years past, federally-mandated debris management processes consisted of a largely manual process of load ticket administration, distribution, and summarization. The use of the traditional paper load ticket in debris management is fraught with problems related to the very nature of the paper ticket. The ticket relies on accurate and legible recording of information. There is no way to control or verify the information recorded until it is manually reviewed after the fact. Due to the enormous volume of tickets produced in a typical event, any sort of status reporting and billing activity generally lags well behind the work being performed in the field. This is exacerbated by the delay in collecting, entering, and analyzing the data contained on the paper ticket. Archival and retrieval of the paper tickets also presents a logistical challenge. A database of electronically-managed tickets and recorded data entry fields can greatly improve data quality and timeliness while reducing the logistical challenges of finding and reporting from paper tickets. However, one of the primary limitations in electronically collecting and reporting debris management information after a catastrophic hurricane event is the potential lack of traditional electronic or wireless network to transfer information in a timely and reliable manner.