Google and Twitter helped to fill the void left by...

Department used Twitter to communicate with the public throughout the storm, said Emily Rehimi, the department’s social media manager. In the hours after Sandy made landfall, NYFD tweeted out safety tips and emergency preparedness information, she said. But beginning at the height of the storm, she began fielding what amounted to tweeted 9-1-1 calls -- requests for help from people who had lost power and did not have the ability to call 9-1-1. Rehimi said she repeatedly urged the department’s Twitter followers to use the 9-1-1 system if they could, and relayed information to dispatchers from users who had no other way to get help. Once the storm passed, she began tweeting out information to people who had lost power. Rehimi said she also worked with NYFD’s press office to validate and invalidate information being disseminated on Twitter to avoid “unnecessary panic.” Rehimi urged the FCC to look into ways to make next-generation 911 social media-accessible. Google also deployed emergency resources during Sandy, said Nigel Snoad, product manager for Google’s Crisis Response team. Google deployed its Google Public Alerts service four days prior to the storm’s landfall, he said. The service placed official federal and local emergency information and other resources at the top of any web search for “Sandy,” Snoad said. Google originally developed the Public Alerts service in response to its experience during the 2011 Japan earthquake and tsunami, when users in Hawaii filled Google with searches for tsunami information, Snoad said. Google also deployed map layers to provide users with information about available emergency resources, including fuel and food distribution locations, he said.