The United Nations is working with crowdsourcing platform, MicroMappers, to assess how much destruction has been caused by the latest typhoon to hit the Philippines

At least 27 people have been killed and a million people evacuated after Typhoon Hagupit (locally known as Ruby) made landfall in the Philippines on Saturday night. Though Hagupit appears to be weakening as it approaches the Philippines capital, Manila, it’s thought to have destroyed around 80% of all the homes along some coastal areas.

Like Typhoon Haiyan, last year, technology is again being used to help identify damage and needs assessment on the ground. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in Manila has requested support from crowdsourcing platform, MicroMappers; asking people to get involved in the disaster response by identifying tweets that refer to urgent needs, infrastructure damage and humanitarian aid. People have also been asked by the UN to identify pictures posted on Twitter that show disaster damage.



MicroMappers Map showing tweets which mention urgent needs, infrastructure damage and humanitarian aid regarding Typhoon Ruby.

As per the ICRC’s guidelines on data protection and privacy, the Tweet Map does not include any personal identifying information (PII). This PII along with the raw tweets are only only shared with the United Nations.

If you’d like to help to get involved, all the information on how to use MicroMappers to support the UN’s relief efforts in the Philippines can be found on this link.