ATC-67-4

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Client: Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)

Final Product: We are pleased to announce the release of ROVER (Rapid Observation of Vulnerability and Estimation of Risk), a FEMA-sponsored smartphone application for building professionals (engineers, architects, firefighters, building officials, and others) to do rapid pre- and post-earthquake hazard evaluation of buildings. ROVER brings the advantages of smartphones to the de-facto paper-based standards for rapid pre-earthquake screening and post-earthquake safety tagging of buildings with red (unsafe), yellow (restricted use), or green (inspected) placards (i.e., FEMA 154 procedures for rapid visual screening of buildings for potential seismic hazards, and ATC-20 procedures for postearthquake safety evaluation of buildings). These procedures have been used on hundreds of thousands of buildings, beginning with ATC-20 inspections after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake near San Francisco. ROVER adds the efficiency of built-in soil and seismology geodatabases, unlimited watermarked and captioned digital photos, automatic geolocation, real-time process control, a secure web-accessible database, integration with the U. S. Geological Survey software, ShakeCast, for real-time earthquake monitoring and with HAZUS-MH (FEMA multi-hazard damage and loss estimation software) for prospective risk analysis, and other features. ROVER can inform emergency preparation, business continuity planning related to natural disaster, disaster management, and broader efforts for sustainable building. ROVER has already been successfully tested by the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Utah Seismic Safety Commission, and others. Visit www.ROVERReady.org to download the software and to view assessments by independent testers of the software. The software can also be ordered on CD from the FEMA Publications Warehouse: Call 1-800-480-2520 and ask for "FEMA P-154 ROVER CD." See details here.

ROVER was developed for FEMA by the Applied Technology Council, in collaboration with specialists form SPA Risk LLC, and Instrumental Software Technologies Inc., and a professional review panel of leading building officials, scholars, and practitioners.

Welcome to the ATC Team!

Michael Valley

As a former Principal at Magnusson Klemencic Associates in Seattle, Mike Valley comes to ATC with more than 30 years of structural engineering experience in new design, evaluation and retrofit of existing buildings, applied research, and codes and standards development. Mike’s design experience includes the landmark Salesforce Tower in San Francisco, and his research and development experience includes the FEMA 356 Prestandard and Commentary for the Seismic Rehabilitation of Buildings, FEMA P-2012 Assessing Seismic Performance of Buildings with Configuration Irregularities (ATC-123 Project), and NIST GCR 10-917-9 Applicability of Nonlinear Multiple-Degree-of-Freedom Modeling for Design (ATC-76-6 Project).

Mike also has extensive experience as an ATC consultant serving as a reviewer, a technical contributor, and Project Director on multiple ATC projects. We look forward to how Mike’s unique experiences as a successful team member will contribute to ATC projects in the future.

Michael Mahoney

Retired from federal service as a Senior Geophysicist with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), Mike Mahoney comes to ATC with more than 30 years of experience in hazard mitigation program management and policy development, post-disaster response and recovery, and problem-focused research and development in support of FEMA’s efforts under the National Earthquake Hazards Reduction Program (NEHRP). He has led FEMA’s earthquake-related work with the International Code Council and has been involved with the development of national model codes and standards since 1984.

In his career at FEMA, Mike has led the development of countless major FEMA publications, including: FEMA 350 Recommended Seismic Design Criteria for New Steel Moment-Frame Buildings and its series of companion reports (ATC-41 Project series), FEMA P-58 Seismic Performance Assessment of Buildings, Methodology and Implementation (ATC-58 Project series), FEMA P-695 Quantification of Building Seismic Performance Factors (ATC-63 Project), FEMA P-2018 Seismic Evaluation of Older Concrete Buildings for Collapse Potential (ATC-78 Project), and FEMA P-2090/NIST SP-1254 Recommended Options for Improving the Built Environment for Post-Earthquake Reoccupancy and Functional Recovery Time (ATC-137 Project). With Mike’s extensive knowledge of federal government programs, and past collaboration with state and local agencies, hazard mitigation partners, and code development organizations, we look forward to how his unique experiences will help serve ATC’s client needs and objectives in the future.