The Watch Duty fire tracking app has become a crucial source of information for Los Angeles residents threatened by ongoing wildfires.
As TechCrunch’s Maxwell Zeff explained, the app relies on a network of active and retired firefighters, first responders, official government reports and volunteer reporters who monitor radio scanners to provide real-time updates on active fires.
During this week’s wildfires, where official alerts could be wrong or inaccurate, Watch Duty climbed to the top of Apple’s App Store charts. And in an interview Saturday with The New York Times, CEO John Mills said the app had been downloaded 2 million times as of Tuesday and had seen 14 million unique users this week.
Mills said the app is operated by a nonprofit organization funded primarily by donations, with 15 full-time employees and 200 employees. He insisted that Watch Duty collects very little personal data about users and that it has no intention of selling.
“I owe it to my community not to be a disaster capitalist,” he said.
