August 17, 2018 By Kait Parker 3 min read

Witnessing the aftermath of a devastating event

Silence. Utter and complete silence . . . punctured only by soft sobs or frantic, searching screams.

The first time I stood in a field of debris that had been a neighborhood only moments before, it was the silence that struck me. At 4:50am, this community of homes was a soft hum of electricity—air conditioning units, refrigerators, and early alarms going off to start the day—by 4:52am, it was reduced to nothing by an EF-3 tornado.

Here’s a moment I captured that day:

Miraculously, no one died when that tornado hit, but as soon as the shock ended, there was a flurry of action. Friends, neighbors, and relatives searching for one another, praying to find their children or pets safe amongst the rubble. No emergency services were there yet and there was no cell phone service available to call for help. Just a few of the many byproducts of a disaster you don’t think about until it’s too late.

The raw, emotional moments of devastation following a natural disaster were imprinted on me that day. A person’s need is never greater than when their world has been turned upside down.

How can we help when disaster strikes?

Every day I report on another disaster from around the world on The Weather Channel app. We stare at our phones, captivated by the images, perhaps even sending silent prayers to those affected, but rarely imagining what would happen if it was us in those painful stories.

Our meteorological skill has improved by leaps and bounds over the last 20 years—tornado lead times can exceed 20 minutes; five days out, we have an idea of where a hurricane will make landfall; months in advance, we can tell if drought conditions will persist.

The seemingly endless disastrous weather that plagues our newsfeeds is a harbinger of things to come. We know through research that wildfires are not only happening more frequently around the globe, but with increased ferocity. The atmosphere is holding more water, making monsoons exponentially worse, and hurricanes and typhoons are creating deadly storm surges worsened by the rise in our seas. Not only that, but the number of people living in disaster-prone areas has skyrocketed, increasing by the millions.

The one constant in all these catastrophes is the need for help. Immediately after or during the devastating event, how can you reach for help if cell phone towers have been destroyed? How do you let your friends and family know you are safe? And once the shock wears off, how do you pick up the pieces? How do we find the people who are in desperate need of help and get them back on their feet? How do we sustain through long-term disasters such as drought?

There is an answer; in all the heartbreak, there is hope. The very best of humanity rises to the occasion when disaster strikes and now there is the chance to lessen the blow, for the best of mankind to help before the next natural disaster.

Call for Code is looking for the solution

Call for Code is a rallying cry for developers from all over the world to help create the next big solution to disaster crises. The creator, The David Clark Cause, with founding partner IBM, looks to find the next big thing when it comes to saving lives. Essentially a hackathon for global good, Call for Code is a rallying cry for code to address our most pressing societal challenges—whether it is helping to locate those who need help, minimizing health risks, or reducing the vulnerability to disaster.

As a meteorologist, I do the best I can to inform and prepare people before a storm. However, there is nothing I can do to stop Mother Nature. Perhaps the next great advancement of our age, a better way to protect people from destruction, is an idea you have . . . a code that can save lives. Take your first steps to answer the Call for Code by signing up here.

More from

Advance your enterprise Journey to Hybrid Cloud and AI powered by AIOps on Z

2 min read - Thanks to rising costs, skills shortages and ever-growing security threats, businesses must adapt quickly to shifts in demand patterns brought on by a digital workforce and rapidly changing buyer behavior. That requires putting extra emphasis on the resiliency and performance of your business processes and supporting applications. For larger IT organizations with increasingly hybrid and complex application landscapes that often include IBM Z®, it’s essential to take a comprehensive approach to IT operations. The challenge becomes “How do you effectively sift through terabytes of…

IBM API Connect named a leader in the Forrester Wave: API Management Software, Q3 2024

4 min read - We are excited to announce that Forrester has recognized IBM API Connect® as a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: API Management Software, Q3 20241. Forrester conducted a 24-criteria evaluation of API management software providers to make their assessment and final results. IBM API Connect received the highest score possible in 17 out of the 24 criteria. [button link="https://www.ibm.com/account/reg/us-en/signup?formid=urx-52934"]Download a complimentary copy of the report here[/button] IBM: What to look for when shopping for API Management Software Transformation and integration initiatives…

Success and recognition of IBM offerings in G2 Summer Reports  

2 min read - IBM offerings were featured in over 1,365 unique G2 reports, earning over 230 Leader badges across various categories.   This recognition is important to showcase our leading products and also to provide the unbiased validation our buyers seek. According to the 2024 G2 Software Buyer Behavior Report, “When researching software, buyers are most likely to trust information from people with similar roles and challenges, and they value transparency above other factors.”  With over 90 million visitors each year and hosting more than 2.6…

IBM Newsletters

Get our newsletters and topic updates that deliver the latest thought leadership and insights on emerging trends.
Subscribe now More newsletters