Search sector software that shows what has actually been searched

Most search operations still run their sectors on a laminated map, a whiteboard and a stack of task forms. It works until the operation gets big or runs into the night. Then the whiteboard and the map drift apart, two teams walk the same drainage, one corner of the search area is never assigned, and at shift change nobody can say with confidence which sectors are really done.

Search sector software fixes the bookkeeping, not the judgement. Deciding where the boundary goes and which sector gets your best team is still the coordinator’s job; our guide to search sector planning covers that methodology in detail. This page is about what happens next: how Redoto Rescue holds the sectors, the assignments and the evidence of coverage in one place while the search is moving.

01Why paper maps and whiteboards stop scaling

Paper is not the problem. Paper is fast, robust and does not need a battery. The problem is that a paper-based search keeps the same information in several places at once — the planning map, the whiteboard, the radio log, the team leader’s own map — and every copy is updated by a different person at a different time.

• Sectors overlap or leave gaps. A boundary sketched by hand at the command post is not the boundary the team leader copies onto their own map.
• Status lives in someone’s head. The whiteboard says a sector is assigned; only the radio operator knows the team came back an hour ago.
• "Cleared" means different things. A hasty pass and a tight grid both end up as a tick in the same box.
• Shift change loses the picture. The incoming coordinator inherits marker lines, three handwritings and very little context.
• The after-action file is rebuilt from memory. When someone asks later which ground was searched and when, the answer is a reconstruction.

Digital sectors do not remove any of the decisions. They remove the copying, so the map the coordinator looks at, the map the team leader carries and the record kept for later are the same map.

02Drawing sectors on the mission map

Sectors are drawn as polygons directly on the mission map in the web command center, over topographic or satellite layers. Use the topographic layer to follow contour lines, streams and ridges; switch to satellite to see forest edges, clearings, tracks and buildings that older topo sheets miss. Good sector edges follow features a tired searcher can recognise on the ground, and seeing both layers makes those edges easier to pick.

Every sector belongs to a mission, alongside the mission base locations, the missing-person points and the event log. That matters more than it sounds: there is no separate planning file to keep in sync with the operation, because the sectors are part of the operation. Imported GPX routes can sit on the same map, so a planned route or the subject’s known track can be taken into account when you draw.

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03Last-seen points and search radii

The search area starts from a point: where the missing person was last seen, or their last known position. In Redoto Rescue that point goes on the map as a missing-person point with a search radius drawn around it, so everyone planning sectors is working from the same centre and the same distance. When a person is located, their status changes and the position is on the map for every team and medical unit that needs to reach it.

A radius is a starting hypothesis, not a fence. Terrain, barriers and the subject’s profile reshape the real search area, and the sectors you draw inside and beyond the radius are where that judgement shows. Having the circle on the map simply keeps the hypothesis visible, so when you widen it later, the decision is explicit rather than drifting.

04From sector to assignment

Each sector is assigned to a tactical team. Teams in Redoto Rescue have leaders and callsigns, and their members’ live positions come from the field app while they are on duty in the mission. So the coordinator is not reading a list of names next to a polygon; they are looking at the polygon and the team actually in it.

Draw and number the sector

Short numbered identifiers survive a bad radio link. "Sector 7" is unambiguous; a description of the terrain is not.

Assign a team

The assignment shows on the command map and on the team’s phones, so nobody is working from an out-of-date briefing sheet.

Follow the team on the map

Live positions and recorded tracks show whether the team is in its sector, on the approach, or in the neighbouring drainage by mistake.

Update coverage

Coverage is tracked as a percentage per sector, so a partial pass stays visibly partial instead of turning into "done".

Close, or send a second pass

A sector with low coverage stays on the map as a candidate for another team when the high-probability sectors come up empty.

05Tracks as evidence of coverage

The most honest coverage report is not what a team says on the radio. It is the line their phones drew while they searched. Redoto Rescue records each on-duty rescuer’s GPS track, and those tracks plot which ground has actually been walked. Laid over the sector polygon, they show the gap on the steep side that nobody mentioned, or the stretch where the team followed the trail instead of the grid.

Mobile coverage in real search terrain is patchy, so the field app is built to tolerate it and to fill in the track once the phone reaches signal again. Our article on GPS tracking of rescue teams explains why that buffering matters, and how to handle location data under GDPR. For the tracking side of the product itself, see live GPS tracking.

06The same sectors on every rescuer’s phone

The field app shows each rescuer the mission map with the search sectors, their teammates’ positions, the base locations and the last-seen points with search radii, on topographic or satellite layers. A searcher who can see their own position inside their own sector does not drift into the next drainage because the briefing map and the terrain disagreed. Assignment changes, broadcasts from the coordinator and mission chat reach the team on the same device.

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The mobile app is currently in release preparation; the web command center, where sectors are drawn and managed, is in production today.

07The record for the after-action file

When the operation ends, the sectors, the assignments, the coverage figures, the tracks and the timestamped event log are already attached to the mission. Redoto Rescue generates the after-action report from that record, and the audit trail shows who changed what and when. Nobody has to transcribe a whiteboard at three in the morning.

That record answers the questions that come later — from the debrief, from the family, occasionally from an inquiry. "We searched that area" is not an answer. "Sector 4, Team Bravo, these hours, this coverage, this track" is. It is also what makes the next search better, because you can see which sector sizes your teams really finished in one period.

Search sectors are one part of the wider mission management workflow, and one of the modules listed on the capabilities page. If your team works in steep, remote terrain, the mountain rescue page shows how the pieces fit together in that setting. For the bigger picture of what search and rescue software can do for your organisation, start from the overview.