GIS Aids Oil Spill Response

By Lyle S. Hall

Maine has averaged one vessel related spill of greater than 100,000 gallons every ten years. The last large spill was the oil tanker Julie N that struck the Million Dollar Bridge spanning Portland Harbor in 1996. When it was over 179,634 gallons of oil had spilled into the waters of the Fore River.

Responding to the Julie N and several smaller spills since has taught us a great deal. Foremost, from a GIS perspective, has been that we need to be able to produce maps wherever an Incident Command Center might be set up. Maps need to be produced and delivered to users in something close to one hour or they are generally considered of limited value. If we could create a movable GIS production studio, and set up "next door" to the spill planners, we could minimize the time needed to deliver maps and maximize the time available to create maps. What was needed was something modular and expandable, rather like a child's lego construction set. Thus was born the idea for Mobile MOSIS.

In one of the first versions of MOSIS, DEP took an "unskilled user" approach to software design. We sought to keep mapping simple and hide complexity. This approach failed because circumstances differ dramatically from spill to spill. Currently, we use a "skilled user" approach, enabling the department to realize full value for its investment in ArcGIS training.

St. George Consulting designed DEP's current MOSIS version. Despite years of experience designing oil spill response software, this effort was largely Research and Development in nature. Before entering this contract, our experience was based primarily in ESRI's ArcView software. However, DEP had been a beta test site for ArcMap and saw promise in the COM objects and software architecture being proposed. Of course, "glossy lie sheets" and salesman's promises are often not the best foundation upon which to build a software project and we have faced a number of significant challenges.

MOSIS allows users to capture oil spill spatial and attribute information and store this information in an enterprise ORACLE database. All efforts were made in MOSIS' design not to deviate or hide capabilities of ESRI's ArcGIS software suite. Keeping with the lego model of interlocking bricks, functionality was packaged so that it would integrate solidly with our existing software while allowing us the flexibility to build a semi custom response set for any given spill.

From a hardware perspective, MOSIS is basically two Dell 2500 servers (One SDE data server and one Citrix server), a HP 450c plotter and a network switch. Weighing in at something over 400 pounds of total equipment, it does stretch the definition of mobile a bit. What we gain for all this weight is a scalable enterprise GIS system. Our plan is, if ten people with map-making skills and some ArcMap experience arrive with laptops at the spill, their contributions can be integrated quickly into our response efforts.

Once a Citrix client is installed, and the laptop configured on the Mobile MOSIS local network, personnel may immediately access MOSIS software and all our SDE GIS data. "On-the-fly" map products can then be created specific to the spill at hand.

The last aspect of our spill response philosophy is to not rely completely on being able to turn on IT equipment and get it running. During the time between spills, DEP gathers information from a host of sources about critical resources and symbolizes that information onto map series that can be printed in advance and used separately from all our technology. Throughout this fall, MOSIS will be used to create "pre-staged" maps that can be placed in the hands of responders before a spill ever occurs.

Utilizing this combination of high and low tech tools along with a workflow that is meant to allow us to customize our level of response, we expect to be in the best possible position to face the next worst possible oil spill. If you have IT skills that you think could be of assistance to us in our GIS response to a large spill, please feel free to send me your contact information and a brief description of how you might help.

For more information contact project manager Lyle Hall (lyle.s.hall@maine.gov). Lyle has led BRWM's GIS efforts related to Oil spill response for the past six years and has been involved in the management of data and IT projects related to spills for the past 15 years. As a lifelong lover of Legos, he would gladly take any old Lego sets off your hands!

Stuart Rich (sturich@stgeorgeconsulting.com) is president of the St. George Consulting Group, Inc. based in Rockland, Maine (http://www.stgeorgeconsulting.com/). Contact him to discuss the MOSIS project code, and technical challenges.

Programs

GIS Aids Oil Spill Response