Mesh Network Emergency System Challenge

During disasters across Africa, communication networks collapse precisely when they're needed most, leaving communities isolated, emergency responders blind, and families unable to find each other, resulting in preventable deaths and chaos. Cell towers fail from damage or power loss, internet infrastructure gets overwhelmed or destroyed, and emergency services cannot coordinate rescue efforts. 

Current satellite solutions are too expensive for widespread deployment, require technical expertise communities lack, and don't support enough users. Developers must create mesh networks that automatically form during disasters, support 500+ users without infrastructure, enable voice, text, and location sharing, operate for 72+ hours on battery power, transforming disaster response through resilient, community-owned communication.

The Mesh Network Emergency System Challenge seeks innovative solutions for resilient communication networks that automatically form during disasters, supporting 500+ users without any existing infrastructure. This challenge addresses the critical communication blackouts during African disasters where traditional networks fail precisely when communication is most vital for coordinating rescue efforts and saving lives.

Participants must develop self-organizing mesh network systems that automatically establish communication when infrastructure fails, support at least 500 concurrent users within a 5km radius, enable voice calls, text messaging, and location sharing, and operate using only battery power for 72+ hours. The system should work with common smartphones without special hardware, create automatic routing around failed nodes, prioritize emergency communications, and provide offline maps and information sharing.

Successful solutions will demonstrate rapid network formation within 5 minutes of activation, maintain connectivity despite 50% node failure, achieve 5km+ range in urban environments, and support bandwidth management for critical communications. The system must work across different device types (Android, iOS, feature phones), include encryption for sensitive communications, and provide coordination tools for emergency responders.

We particularly value solutions that integrate with existing emergency services, support multiple languages and low-literacy users, include features for finding missing persons, and can be rapidly deployed by non-technical users. The platform should cost under $50 per node, deploy from backpacks or vehicles, work in various disaster scenarios (floods, earthquakes, conflicts), and transform disaster response through resilient communications.