MiCRO is a specialty re-insurance company, a social enterprise focused on the consequences of natural disasters, bridging the divide between the world's insurance markets. It seeks to improve the livelihoods of the most vulnerable against natural hazards like hurricanes, earthquakes, droughts, and floods. In 2015, MiCRO needed the assistance of a GISCorps volunteer in geocoding the locations of small-holder farmers and micro-entrepreneurs across Guatemala. Sami Snunu, a GIS professional from Calgary, Alberta, Canada was then selected and began by accurately, consistently, and easily assigning geospatial coordinates to MiCRO's individual policyholders. Read more here.

Volunteers Digitized Features after Hurricane Patricia
Hurricane Patricia was the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere in terms of barometric pressure and sustained winds. Patricia also grew faster than any Western Hemisphere storm on record, growing from a tropical storm to a Category 5 hurricane in just 24 hours. Once Patricia grew from a tropical storm into a Category 5 hurricane a team of 10 GISCorps volunteers led by Leslie Zolman, a GIS professional from Montana, worked with HOT, Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team, to map the area where Patricia was predicted to make landfall. Read more here.


Mapping Tool Showcases Research on Incidents in the Uyghur Homeland
The Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) has released an online webmap highlighting research from " Legitimizing Repression: China's War on Terror Under Xi Jinping and State Policy in East Turkestan." Based on an analysis of overseas media reports, the March 2015 investigation into incidents of violence and unrest from 2013-2014 counted a total death toll of 656 to 715 lives. The number of fatalities in 2014 is approximately double that of 2013, with a spike from April to July of 2014. Data in the report should not be considered definitive, as the Chinese government tightly controls information in East Turkestan. The numbers nevertheless indicate a deterioration in security conditions since Xi Jinping became Chinese president in early 2013. Read more here.


Afghanistan Earthquake GISCorps Response
A magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck Afghanistan on October 26, 2015. Within hours, the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team (HOT) activated an online work project to support the local OpenStreetMap (OSM) community by digitizing features from existing imagery. In the following three weeks approximately 400 volunteers around the world contributed over 1 million features to OSM. Read more here.


Crowdsource Project Documents Coastal Changes Due to Hurricane Joaquin
Nine GISCorps volunteers assisted with the USGS iCoast Project after Hurricane Joaquin and a related Nor'easter caused extensive damage along the US east coast from South Carolina to New York in October 2015. This project was similar to the work done by our volunteers post Hurricane Sandy on the coasts of New Jersey and New York. The iCoast web application asks volunteers to identify changes to the coast by comparing and tagging aerial photographs taken before and after storms. This data will help USGS scientists improve the accuracy of USGS coastal change prediction models and vulnerability assessments that support pre-storm planning and post-storm rescue, recovery, and mitigation efforts. Read more here.

Read more about other completed GISCorps projects here.