"The Common Operational Picture Exploitation (COPE) project will integrate COTS solutions and novel technologies to achieve a step change in information flow both from and to the first responder in order to increase situational awareness across agencies and at all levels of the command chain. A user-driven approach will be taken to develop new technologies for supporting user information requirements at the scene of the event. First responders belong to a heterogeneous group in terms of crisis environments as well as roles, command structure, organisational and national differences. Therefore, the project will apply a wide range of human factors methods to better understand the processes of individual agencies to ensure that new systems both match requirements and can be integrated with legacy processes and technologies. COPE will use the skills and competencies of a strong team of research scientists both from industry and academia, of technology providers and systems integrators supported by end users. The project will develop use cases with end users to build a rich picture of the requirements and moreover the differences in requirements across agencies, organisations and nations. Supported by the end user community, the requirements will be mapped against the technologies developed to offer tailored solutions. The consortium has much experience from crisis management projects and understands the need to enhance information flow between the first responders and higher command structures for better situational awareness. The project will realise and trial mobile technologies to support first responders by giving them: - the ability to share ground truth with the COP -increased cognitive situational awareness to enhance decision making -support for multi-agency co-operation and communication -the ability to localise personnel, to navigate and to generate maps -the capability to monitor safety issues, tasking, as well as post crisis audit"