As the adage goes, a picture is worth a thousand words.

Now, thanks to a new First Responder App, police, firefighters and possibly state highway crews will be able to help National Grid to respond more rapidly to downed wires and in situations, such as a fire or accident, where they need to shut off electricity or gas.

The app, which provides GPS coordinates to the site, enables National Grid to deploy the crew, equipment and material needed and assess the severity of the situation in context of widespread outages in a major storm. For example, if a pole is down, a truck can be dispatched to the scene with a pole rather than having a crew order the pole after arriving on site.

A demonstration of the free app was part of a walkthrough of National Grid’s new and expanded storm room on Melrose Avenue in Providence last Thursday afternoon. The center, the closest thing locally to NASA Control Center with rows of tables with computer screens and phones in front of each seat and massive screens jutting from the walls, is actually several rooms and contains a variety of high tech tools designed to track storms and storm damage, pinpoint crews in the field and assess when service will be restored.

“At the end of the day, when there’s an interruption, we want to get our folks [customers] back as quickly as possible,” Timothy F. Horan, president and COO of National Grid in Rhode Island, said to the media and officials who lined the walls or sat in front of dark computer screens. Horan added that safety is paramount.

National Grid, with 480,000 Rhode Island electric and 257,000 natural gas customers, staged the tour to coincide with the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Irene hitting Rhode Island as a tropical storm. Tropical Storm Hermine put the system to the test, knocking out more than 6,000 electric customers when it kissed the coast about two weeks ago. National Grid offices also lost power briefly. Generators kick in when there are prolonged outages.

Benefits of the storm room became apparent, says David Graves, the company’s veteran public information officer. With the separation of tasks by room – reports of downed wires are routed to one room, while coordinating and assigning of repair teams is handled in others based on sectors of the state – people are not stumbling over one another, Graves said.

Graves said the storm room and its technology are part of upgrades National Grid has made to the Melrose building over the past three years. He did not release the cost of improvements.

Horan, as well as Joseph Bucci, acting administrator of the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, Peter Gaynor, director of the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency, and representatives of the State Police stressed the importance of working together and coordinating efforts when responding to a disaster.

In fact, as the new responder app was demonstrated, Michael McCallan, director of emergency planning and preparedness for National Grid, was quick to suggest it be provided to state DOT crews, as they, along with police and fire, are frequently the first on a scene.

“That’s more eyes in the field,” McCallan said. Bucci estimated it would be 200 more pairs of eyes.

That prompted the question whether the app could be made available to the public.

Dan Bunszell, vice president of New England Electric Operations, didn’t think that would be practical, although he pointed out that during storm events, social media is monitored.

As for who would man all those computer stations and phones during a storm, Horan said many employees, such as meter readers, are cross-trained to fill those jobs.

The tour included a demonstration of the Integrated Mapping Applications Portal (IMAP) that at a glance gives a picture of where there are outages and the exact locations of responding crews.

“It’s better to partner before a disaster than after,” Gaynor said following the tour.

He pointed out that a National Grid employee is assigned to the state emergency operations center, as are representatives from different state departments, thereby leveraging the networks of different agencies.

While impressed by National Grid technology and how it can help, Gaynor pointed out, “The things that solve problems are the humans in that room.”

A PARTNERSHIP:

Peter Gaynor, director of the Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency, emphasized the importance of coordinating response efforts when the state is hit by a storm.

PINPOINTING PROBLEMS:

Walter McDonald demonstrates the Integrated Mapping Applications Portal (IMAP) that shows the location of outages and the positions of responding crews.

READY FOR THE ROAD:

Michael McCallan, director of emergency planning and preparedness for National Grid, talks about the features of the new Mobile Emergency Operations Center that can be deployed to the scene of a disaster.