Technology confronts disasters
In 2010, soon after Haiti was devastated by an earthquake, a team from MIT Lincoln Laboratory collected and analyzed information to help the U.S. Southern Command (USSOUTHCOM), the lead military agency responding to the crisis, effectively dispatch vital resources, including food, water, tents, and medical supplies, to the victims of this disaster. The laboratory's capabilities in advanced imaging also aided relief operations: A laser-radar imaging system, the Airborne Ladar Imaging Research Testbed (ALIRT), produced high-resolution, three-dimensional renderings of terrain and infrastructure that were used to generate maps indicating road trafficability, helicopter landing zones, and the changes in populations at camps for displaced persons.