An app for tracking fires in the United States has (narrowly) surpassed TikTok

Watch Duty is an app dedicated to wildfires in the United States.It helps professionals in the sector and makes citizens calmer.But maybe it's addictive.

This summer, for a few days, an app unknown to most has reached the top of the ranking of App Store by the number of downloads of free apps, surpassing services such as TikTok, Instagram or ChatGPT.It was about Watch Duty and is managed by one Californian non-profit which aims to monitor forest fires in the territory to help the most affected areas.

Watch Duty receives information in real time by firefighters, volunteers and first responders, i.e. people who intervene directly in rescue operations in the event of a fire.Thanks to this continuous feedback, can provide maps and information about fires and their evolution, and achieved 2.8 million users.

The main focus is on United States of America, in particular thirteen states among the most affected by this type of phenomenon, which have been made increasingly extreme and frequent.A risk that is continually growing due to climate change and of drought:according to Bloomberg, today in the US they would be approximately 44 million homes at risk of fire, up from thirty million in 1990.

Watch Duty and social media addiction

It has developed around the application a very particular community, of people who have lost everything or almost everything due to the fire and find themselves consulting it compulsively.One of the witnesses heard by Bloomberg talked about the post-traumatic stress syndrome which he has been suffering from since a fire consumed his home, which he is treating with therapy but also thanks to the app.What might be a bizarre form of doom scrolling – the practice of staring at social media in an unhealthy way – is actually an antidote to panic:the possibility of always being updated on fires, observing them on a map, can provide 'enormous mental calm'.

This feeling is also recorded among the approx one hundred people – Watch Duty volunteers – who provide data and updates to the app.Some of these users, including many firefighters, they do it for work but have confessed to trying a sense of dependence from the app similar to what many try for TikTok.

The success of Watch Duty is explained above all because it gave a single location (and a single feed) to the many reports and testimonies on the fires, which would otherwise be scattered across government sites or social networks.Despite being a non-profit, Watch Duty is launching also “pro” services, for paying customers.

Paying $25 a year, for example, it is possible to track in real time the planes and helicopters used to fight fires, and the company has recently launched a subscription campaign aimed at large companies and institutions.Among the first to sign it was the energy company PG&E Corp., who had already been using Watch Duty for some time before organizing the interventions of his technicians, especially in California.To date, approximately four thousand employees have signed up for the service.Watch Duty is not unique:there is among its competitors Firespot, which however can count on fewer reporters and therefore fewer updates.

The case of Watch Duty may remind you the explosion of weather sites and applications occurred in recent years, given the increase in interest - and apprehension - of many towards the weather, both in summer and winter).But if it is also found in the weather sector lots of sensationalism and clickbait, Watch Duty stands out for a completely different approach.And there are those who can no longer do without it.