Why SOS

Disasters move quickly. When the systems designed to manage them can’t keep up, everyone suffers.

Over the past twenty years, most disaster after action reports end with a similar analysis.

Communication blackouts. No mutual aid coordination. Offline emergency management systems. Contradictory maps and routing. Lost data. No cross-jurisdictional support. Understaffed agencies. A confused public.

  • Displacement

    In a single year, 3.3 million U.S. adults were displaced by natural disasters.² Communities are hit with disaster while recovering from a previous one.

  • Funding Gaps

    FEMA expects the Disaster Relief Fund, the money that pays for federal disaster response, to run a major deficit.³

  • Uncoordinated Help

    After Hurricane Helene, nonprofits applied for disaster assistance while operating in siloed systems with no shared situational awareness.

  • Fraud

    77% of survivors are targeted by potential scammers within the first thirty days after a disaster.¹

Helpers already respond to disasters. They just need coordination infrastructure.

Because of fractured data collection and inadequate tools that don’t communicate with each other, community responders experience needless burnout and discouragement. Yet, they power through obstacles to serve the public and recover from disaster. They show up, with paper binders. They try, with expensive software that fails under surge demand.

How SOS works

Common questions

Why do disaster relief efforts lose track of people who need help?

Requests arrive by phone, text, social media, and paper, and the tools responders use rarely talk to each other. Needs get duplicated or missed, and volunteers burn out re-entering the same information.

What does SOS do differently?

SOS gathers every request, resource, and community report in one place, checks which ones are verified, and helps local responders match needs to the help that's available. A person always makes the final decision.

Does SOS replace 911 or emergency management?

No. SOS supports community responders and emergency managers. For life-threatening emergencies, call 911.