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Disaster response · Venezuela + Colombia

Venezuela + Colombia Earthquake Response

This open-source initiative began with Venezuela's earthquake recovery and expanded after the August 10 earthquake in Colombia. From August 11–16, participants are building and documenting reusable prototypes with public, synthetic, or sample data; Demo Day is August 17.

Format
Online · Global
Kickoff
Wed, Jul 8
Build
Aug 11 – Aug 16
Demo day
Mon, Aug 17
Stay informedSee what you’ll build

How the initiative grew

It began in Venezuela. Following the August 10 earthquake, it expanded for Colombia.

On June 24, the earthquakes in Venezuela exposed urgent gaps in damage assessment, communication, family tracing, and aid coordination. We built this initiative to turn that response into reusable, open foundations. The August 10 earthquake in Colombia makes the reason clear: communities need solutions that can move quickly without losing local context.

Scenario 01 · Venezuela

June 24, 2026

Where the initiative began

Venezuela revealed the response gaps

After the M7.2 and M7.5 earthquakes in north-central Venezuela, the initiative focused builders on recovery coordination, family tracing, damage assessment, health, connectivity, and transparent aid delivery, while inviting responder and local-knowledge review.

That first response became the foundation: open starters, shared guardrails, and workflows designed to be adapted—not copied blindly.
Read the Venezuela situation brief →

Scenario 02 · Colombia

August 10, 2026 · Active response

Why the initiative expanded

Colombia puts those foundations to work

The August 10 M7.4 earthquake near San José del Palmar, Chocó, brings new local realities: distributed building damage, rural access, low connectivity, landslide and liquefaction risk, and an urgent need for verified information.

This is why the initiative was built to travel: reuse what works, replace what does not fit, and validate every decision with Colombian expertise.
Open the Colombia scenario brief →

One initiative · regional by design

Venezuela started the work. Colombia carries it forward.

This is not a second, disconnected hackathon. Teams share open-source starters, lessons, and safety guardrails, then seek validation of language, data sources, authorities, hazards, and workflows from people who know each place. Every result remains open to inspect and adapt; operational use requires local governance, safeguarding, security review, and field validation.

Scenario 01 · Venezuela

The June 24 earthquakes in north-central Venezuela have moved from emergency response into a difficult early-recovery phase.

A powerful M7.2 and M7.5 sequence struck north-central Venezuela on June 24. PAHO and other UN agencies documented extensive health, shelter, protection, access, and essential-service needs as the emergency developed.

By August 11, Associated Press reported more than 6,300 deaths. PAHO described the health response as entering early recovery, focused on restoring essential services, referral networks, and prevention of secondary public-health emergencies.

The World Bank estimated US$19.6 billion in direct physical damage. These reported figures are timestamped snapshots, not permanent final totals. Recovery tools must keep observed evidence separate from models and protect personal data.

M7.2 → M7.5
Two quakes ~40 seconds apart · June 24, 2026 (USGS)
>6,300
deaths reported by Associated Press · 11 August 2026
$19.6B
estimated direct physical damage (World Bank GRADE)

Sources: USGS · PAHO/WHO early recovery update · Associated Press · World Bank GRADE assessment. Figures reflect early reporting and may change as the response develops.

What you’ll build

One toolkit, reusable across both scenarios

Pick a response gap below, then choose the scenario where you can contribute the strongest local knowledge. Cross-scenario teams can extract reusable components while country-focused teams validate what works on the ground.

You don't have to start from an empty repo. Every track below has an open-source starter template — a working app, not a skeleton — plus a reference build showing roughly where it could go. Fork one and you're editing real code in a few minutes.

01

Rapid Damage Mapping

Turn satellite, drone, and social-media imagery into live maps of collapsed buildings, blocked roads, and the hardest-hit zones — so responders know where to go first.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
02

Search, Rescue & Missing Persons

Help families and agencies register, find, and reconnect missing people, and coordinate search-and-rescue across organizations without duplicating effort.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
03

Needs & Resources Matching

Match urgent needs — medical care, water, shelter, food — to the nearest available supplies, shelters, and volunteers in real time.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
04

Aftershock & Structural Safety

Aftershock-aware risk guidance and fast structural triage to flag which buildings are unsafe to re-enter and keep people out of danger.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
05

Connectivity & Information

Offline-first, low-bandwidth, and multilingual (Spanish and Indigenous languages) tools that get trustworthy information to affected people and responders.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
06

Epidemic & WASH Surveillance

Prototype privacy-preserving, aggregate reporting of symptoms, water conditions, and service availability so qualified public-health teams can investigate possible clusters and unsafe water points.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
07

Aid & Cash Distribution Integrity

Make sure help reaches the right people: de-duplicate beneficiary lists across agencies, catch double-counting and exclusion, and flag fraudulent sign-ups and fake donation drives.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
08

Rumor & Misinformation Verification

Cut through the noise: detect and verify viral claims — recycled footage, false casualty or looting rumors, scam links — and surface what’s confirmed to responders and the public.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
09

Child Protection & Family Tracing

Safely reconnect unaccompanied and separated children with their families, with safeguarding, consent, and anti-trafficking controls built in from the start — privacy-by-design and synthetic data only, never a public board.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗
10

Open / Bring your own idea

Have a different idea that helps people in this disaster? Bring it. The best ideas often come from the people closest to the problem.

Use this template ↗See it running ↗

Not just developers

Not a developer? Here’s how you fit in.

Every track needs more than code. Here’s what these roles look like in practice.

Track-specific expertise

GIS & remote-sensing analysts

The same discipline the Humanitarian OpenStreetMap Team is using right now on its own live Venezuela earthquake mapping project (not affiliated with this hackathon). Coordinate systems, damage-zone geometry, and the cartographic mistakes that look fine in a demo and mislead a responder in the field.

Search-and-rescue personnel

Ground the sector-assignment and matching logic in how multi-agency search actually works under real field conditions, not how it looks on a whiteboard.

Logisticians & supply-chain specialists

The matching and dispatch logic mirrors real last-mile relief distribution. Unrealistic assumptions show up fast to someone who’s done this.

Structural & civil engineers

ATC-20-informed structural triage is a proposed contribution, not a capability in the current starter. Structural engineers can define safe scope, warnings, escalation, and the boundary between software guidance and an authorized evaluation.

Telecom & network engineers

Including amateur radio operators. The offline-first, low-bandwidth design needs someone who’s actually run communications on a degraded network.

Epidemiologists & public-health specialists

The outbreak-alerting logic borrows from real syndromic-surveillance practice. A public-health background catches false alerts before they reach a clinic, or a missed real one.

Fraud examiners & forensic accountants

Real beneficiary-fraud patterns look different from what a synthetic dataset assumes. This is exactly your domain.

Digital-verification & OSINT specialists

Pressure-test the claim-triage and scam-link heuristics against real disinformation patterns, not textbook ones.

Social & case workers with safeguarding experience

Matching and consent logic needs real case-management practice behind it — not assumptions about how family tracing “should” work.

Whatever your idea needs

This track is deliberately undefined — bring the expertise your specific idea requires.

Cross-cutting roles

Data engineers

Build adaptable data pipelines and document their interfaces so organizations can evaluate and integrate components without starting over.

Translators

The site currently supports English, Spanish, Filipino, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, and Arabic. Help make technical terms, safety language, and low-connectivity flows clear and culturally appropriate in every language.

Designers

These are operational tools, not marketing sites: usability under stress, low bandwidth, and accessibility matter more than polish.

Humanitarian-data specialists

Help a track’s data model speak the standards real humanitarian information systems already use, instead of reinventing conventions that exist.

Legal, data-governance & cybersecurity specialists

Review licenses, privacy boundaries, threat models, and implementation guidance so organizations can adopt the open tools responsibly.

People with local knowledge of Venezuela or Colombia

Place names, institutions, languages, access constraints, and community priorities must be reviewed locally before a prototype can be considered for real use.

Open by default

We are creating tools open to humanity: open-source, inspectable, and adaptable.

Every submission ships as a public repository under Apache 2.0 (or another OSI-approved license). Organizations, institutions, communities, and developers can inspect and adapt the work. Operational use still requires local validation, governance, safeguarding, security review, and accountable ownership.

Open code, never people’s data

“Open” means your code — never the personal information or precise locations of affected people. Build and demo with synthetic or sample data. In a disaster, leaked data can put people in real danger, so protecting privacy and dignity is part of how projects are judged.

See how to submit your project →

After the hackathon

After Demo Day, the tools stay open to humanity.

Every qualifying project remains public and open-source. No organization gets exclusive access: humanitarian groups, public institutions, communities, and technical teams can evaluate the code and adapt it to local conditions under the license.

Public-data tools — open to evaluate

Damage mapping, aftershock information, connectivity, and other tools built on public feeds can be adopted by any organization. Implementers should validate local sources, authorities, languages, hazards, and operational workflows before field use.

Sensitive-data tools — open code, governed use

The code for missing-persons, child-protection, and aid-integrity tools remains open. Real personal data does not: each implementing organization must use its own lawful data agreements, access controls, safeguarding process, and security review.

Adoption remains collaborative

Organizations can evaluate the tools independently, ask the community for help, and contribute improvements upstream. Local responders, data engineers, security specialists, translators, and legal and ethics reviewers are essential before responsible adoption.

How it works

  1. Wed, Jul 8, 11:15 UTC

    Initiative launch & kickoff

    We launched globally at a moment when 99% of humanity experienced some degree of sunlight, including twilight, and opened registration and the first Venezuela recovery foundations.

  2. Aug 11 – Aug 16

    Venezuela + Colombia build sprint

    Six focused days to create, adapt, test, and document open-source prototypes for organizations to inspect and validate locally.

  3. Sun, Aug 16

    Submissions due

    Ship your project with a short demo video and a public, open-source repo (Apache 2.0) by 23:59 (anywhere on Earth).

    Open the submission form →
  4. Mon, Aug 17

    Demo day & judging

    Teams present from 15:00–17:00 UTC. Judges score real-world impact, responsible design, technical merit, and how readily others can reuse the work.

Judging & recognition

Humanitarian impact

Does it address a real, current need in this response?

Deployability

Could responders or affected people actually use it soon — not someday?

Technical merit

The craft, ingenuity, and soundness of what you built.

Responsible & humane design

Privacy, dignity, accessibility, and works in low-resource, low-connectivity settings.

Openness

Required: open-source (Apache 2.0 or similar) and built to be reused well beyond this event — the most reusable projects stand out.

This is about impact, not prize money. Standout work will be featured, but every qualifying project contributes to the same public commons. The goal is practical, documented, fully open-source technology that organizations can inspect, adapt, and implement.

FAQ

Who can join?+

Anyone, anywhere — engineers, data scientists, GIS and mapping people, cybersecurity and data-governance specialists, translators, designers, first responders, humanitarian-data and legal/ethics reviewers, and anyone with local knowledge of Venezuela or Colombia. All skill levels are welcome.

How much does it cost?+

Nothing. It’s free and fully online.

Do I need a team?+

No. Register solo and we’ll help you find teammates, or bring your own team of up to five people.

Do I need to be in Venezuela?+

No — it’s global and remote. That said, Spanish speakers and people with local knowledge are especially valuable.

What should I build on?+

Your choice of stack. We’ll share datasets, APIs, and problem briefs at kickoff. Every project must be open-source — we recommend Apache 2.0.

How do I submit my project?+

Use the submission form on the “Submit your project” page (linked from the timeline above). You’ll paste a public, open-source repo link and a short demo video link, plus a sentence on what it does. The deadline is Sunday, August 16, 2026, 23:59 anywhere on Earth — and you can resubmit to update right up to then.

What about data and privacy?+

Disaster data involves real, vulnerable people. Open-source your code — but never commit real personal data or precise locations. Build with synthetic or sample data. Protecting privacy and dignity is part of how projects are judged.

What happens after Demo Day?+

Every qualifying project remains public and fully open-source so any organization can inspect, fork, adapt, and implement it. Standout work will be featured, and teams may keep improving it with the community. Implementations that touch real personal data still require the adopting organization’s own lawful agreements, access controls, safeguarding, and security review.

How do I get help if I'm stuck?+

Email alexcastellanos29@gmail.com — that reaches a real person and is the fastest way to get unblocked. GitHub issues and pull requests on the track template repositories are not monitored during the hackathon, so please use email; anything opened there may go unanswered.

This hackathon has concluded

The inaugural earthquake-response event is preserved here as a public record. Registration and submissions are closed, but you can explore its projects or stay informed about the next one-week disaster-response hackathon.

Stay informedView past projects