Emergency communication system by heterogeneous wireless networking

Quickly establishing a temporary communication system to support emergency management is one of the most urgent tasks in the disaster relief mission. To facilitate the rescue teams and victim people to communicate inside and outside the disaster site, this paper proposes an integrated communication system by composing heterogeneous wireless networks. Firstly, wireless sensor network (WSN) and mobile ad hoc network (MANET) are deployed on the disaster site for local communication and information collection. To communicate with the remote disaster-safe areas, satellite gateway is used for the local networks to interconnect with the satellite mobile network. Furthermore, cellular gateway is used as an alternative remote communication means when the expansion of local networks reaches a working cellular base station. The overall system architecture, the relevant network elements, and the methods of establishing and integrating them to be a mission system are described. The proposed system can help to reduce the network deployment time, support more terminal types, and provide emergency management services.