Sending Pictures during Exercise Ketley

Introduction

Exercise Ketley was a high profile event involving Raynet and other volunteer groups from across the county of Kent. The plan was to show how well the agencies all worked together. This slideshow shares some of the pictures sent during the exercise which allowed the County Emergency Centre in Maidstone to view events as they unfolded on the day.

Alongside Message Sending by voice the transmission of Pictures and Files is an important value added service that Raynet can provide to its users.

County Emergency Centre Maidstone was in contact with the incident sites on the Isle of Sheppey via a Raynet repeater on Detling Hill.

Initial Views Eastchurch Airstrip, and view of which helicopter landed

Some Images from Exercise Ketley

Skywatch Helicopter and aircraft arrive at Eastchurch Airstrip to give pictures to Raynet to transmit. These images were sent across the county from the Isle of Sheppey to County Emergency Control Maidstone via a repeater at Detling.

There were many similar pictures received from Skywatch and so Raynet composed Thumbnails at Eastchurch Airfield allowing the CEPO to see all images quickly and ask for those of interest to be transmitted in full screen.

A number of Images received from Skywatch were too small and had to be enhanced by Raynet prior to sending, this one showing a survivor had to be magnified.

Survivors arriving at Warden Point

Warden Point Cliffside Rescue

The Following slides are in full screen as sent.

Warden Point Preparation for Clifftop Rescue

Warden Point Clifftop Rescue

Warden Point Survivors Arrive

Survivors Arriving at the ‘All Tide Landing’ at Queenborough.

First survivors landed at ‘All Tide Landing’

Survivors arrive at the rest Centre and are checked in.

Views of rest centre can be sent to County Emergency Control.

Views of County Emergency Control, Maidstone with pictures displayed on large screen.

The image Quality to be sent can be chosen by the CEPO, higher resolution pictures for better larger displays and less JPG compression giving improved detail take longer to sendSo it will be a choice between volume and quality per channel.The image can be sent original resolution or downsized to a number of resolutions

Resolution

640 X 480

800 X 600

1024 X 768

1280 X 1024

No Downsize

This Resolution is used.

1280 x 1024 image very best quality jpg takes 533 seconds (nearly 9 minutes!) to send.See Slider at bottom of picture.

1280 x 1024 image good quality jpg takes 170 seconds (2.8 minutes)See Slider at bottom of picture.

1280 x 1024 image lower quality jpg takes 121 seconds (2 minutes)See Slider at bottom of picture.And look at grass area in next picture.

1280 x 1024 image low quality jpg takes 53 seconds (<1 minute) BUT too much detail is lost look at grass area for effect of compression.

1280 x 1024 image low quality jpg takes just 22 seconds BUT obviously unusable.

The Original Scene was taken at 4000 x 3000 pixelsAnd so it would be possible to cut out the detail of the helicopter and transmit it with no quality loss.

Conclusion

The system used in Exercise Ketley is a Digital system with error correction called ‘Digital Radio Mondiale‘ (an ETSI Standard)

Light encoding error correction was used, and greater levels of error correction are possible (Medium and Heavy)

A mode of operation to take account of fading signals was used, greater protection could also be used. Therefore Raynet is confident that Files & Pictures can get through if adverse conditions are experienced.

Exercise Ketley has shown that high quality pictures can be sent via repeaters across Kent to enable the CEPO to ‘see’ events in detail to enable decisions to be made.

Conclusion

The system used in Exercise Ketley is a Digital system with error correction called ‘Digital Radio Mondiale‘ (an ETSI Standard)

Light encoding error correction was used, and greater levels of error correction are possible (Medium and Heavy)

A mode of operation to take account of fading signals was used, greater protection could also be used. Therefore Raynet is confident that Files & Pictures can get through if adverse conditions are experienced.

Exercise Ketley has shown that high quality pictures can be sent via repeaters across Kent to enable the CEPO to ‘see’ events in detail to enable decisions to be made.

After the Exercise

After the exercise, Senior Emergency Planning officer for Kent County Council, Steve Scully said

The ability to provide a visual representation at emergency co-ordinates of events on the ground such as incidents, rest centres or the consequence of the incidents like traffic chaos, greatly enhances the decision making ability, thereby assisting with the swift resolution of the event.