During Exercise North Macedonia 21, a disaster response drill jointly organised by NATO’s Euro-Atlantic Disaster Response Coordination Centre (EADRCC) and the Crisis Management Centre of the Republic of North Macedonia, participants got a chance to try out new tools for responding to crises: augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR). These systems helped participants train on new techniques while allowing researchers to see how the new technology responds to real-world use.
Twenty-seven NATO Allies and partner countries took part, along with 16 regional and international organisations.
Footage includes various shots of AR/VR systems, an interview with a Romanian VR specialist, and with the exercise director from North Macedonia. During filming, exercise participants observed COVID-19 precautions, including wearing masks indoors.
Transcript
SHOTLIST
(00:00) VARIOUS SHOTS – RESEARCHER FROM NORTH MACEDONIA USING AUGMENTED REALITY HEADSET
(00:19) VARIOUS SHOTS – EMERGENCY RESPONDERS FROM ROMANIA USING COMPUTER SIMULATION TO PRACTISE RESPONDING TO DISASTERS
(00:38) SOUNDBITE (ENGLISH) – Dr Emilia Turucz, emergency physician, Romanian Mobile Emergency Service for Resuscitation and Extrication
“We are experimenting how we can include and integrate the virtual reality simulator in a field exercise, actually, and this is our main focus point, I’d say.”
(00:50) SOUNDBITE (ENGLISH) – Dr Emilia Turucz, emergency physician, Romanian Mobile Emergency Service for Resuscitation and Extrication
“The information flow, it’s more controlled and more easy and for them it’s in this way it’s more easy to learn how to use this communication flow in this kind of situation, and this kind of exercise.”
(01:08) SOUNDBITE (ENGLISH) – Dr Urim Vejseli, exercise director for North Macedonia
“NATO Exercise North Macedonia 2021 is really important for our country because as you know, we are a new member, and also one of the objectives of exercise is to test our national capacity and capability and resources as well.”
(01:27) SOUNDBITE (ENGLISH) – Dr Urim Vejseli, exercise director, North Macedonia
“I’m really glad to see how the cooperation is going between the international teams here and also our local emergency management agency, all those activities and operations which are done and which we are planning to do today and tomorrow, it’s going to NICS, so I’m glad to see that, the NICS, Next-generation Incident Command System, works properly. This is the great benefit for us.”
