There may have been little they could have done for the panic that gripped Nova Scotians driven from their homes by wildfires and floods this spring.

But a team of young computer scientists at Dalhousie University believes they could help with the confusion – both for civilians fleeing and first responders driving towards natural disasters.

“We can provide as close to real-time data as possible both to first responders and civilians that during disasters could be life-saving information,” said Aishik Sanyal.

In a lecture hall at Dalhousie’s computer science building on Saturday afternoon, teams of young minds who share a common belief in the power of data to make life better, pitched their ideas.

They were competing in the  NASA International Space Apps Challenge, pitching technological solutions to questions offered up by both NASA and the Canadian Space Agency.

The Halifax event drew 68 primarily young computer scientists who spent Thanksgiving weekend frantically building their proposed solutions and then pitching them on Sunday evening. The event took place simultaneously in 185 countries, drawing 30,000 participants.

“Many of the questions are about how to make day-to-day life better,” said Emran Billah.

Sanyals’ team, composed of Sanyal, Aniq Elahi, Jasper Grant, Paras Nath Seth and Christian Simoneau, pitched an artificial intelligence application dubbed FireLink.

It would accumulate images of natural disasters in the process from drones and satellites and run them through artificial intelligence models that predict behaviour of fires, smoke and floods and then relay that information to first responders and civilians via an app on their smartphones.

For those fleeing, it could help them chart a course to safety.

For those responding, it could provide real-time data on the disaster’s progression and where to send resources.

The drones providing the data to the algorithms could be ones operated by responding agencies or by the many hobbyists whose images could be automatically uploaded and incorporated.

FireLink placed first in the Halifax competition and will now go on to a national competition and then potentially to an international one. For its members, the ultimate hope is to get funded to build and refine FireLink.

The ideas spawned by the competition and the opportunities that may come from them are courtesy of Halifax’s many universities drawing young minds from around the world and its growing place as a node in the knowledge economy.

At 31 years old, Billah finds himself a voice of experience.

“Halifax is a place where if you want to have an exciting life and career, you can, but you have to put in the effort,” said Billah.

He’s been doing that since arriving from Bangladesh in 2011 to study computer sciences at St. Mary’s University. He then added an electrical engineering degree from Dalhousie University and now works for a couple of companies, amongst other things, developing drinkable water solutions by crunching big loads of data from around the world.

“You have to go and find the opportunities,” said Billah.

“Events like this are a great example. They meet people and get the inspiration that gives them the energy to do the hard work.”