Patrols in EarthRanger have been updated to give you a fuller picture of every Patrol. You can now record everyone who goes out, the equipment they take, and the details your program needs to track. Only the team lead needs to start the Patrol. Everyone else just turns on tracking in EarthRanger Mobile, and their work is linked to the Patrol automatically. Once your Patrols are in, you can see a summary of them at a glance in EarthRanger Web.

Here’s a look at what’s new and how to get the most out of it.

What's new 

• Your whole team, in one Patrol
  You can now add everyone on a Patrol, along with the equipment they’re taking, and see who’s leading. That way you always know who was in the field and in what role. Any events your team members report during the Patrol are linked to it automatically, so you see your team’s work as one shared effort. In EarthRanger Mobile, you’re set as the Patrol Lead when you start a Patrol, and you can add your team members and assets right from the app.
• The equipment your team takes with them
  Vehicles, radios, drones and other tracked equipment can now be added to a Patrol, so you can see where your equipment went alongside your team. You can even check the distance a vehicle covered.
• Fields that fit your program
  Your organization can add its own fields to Patrols, such as transport type or Patrol mandate. This makes it easier to collect the same information on every Patrol, whichever team goes out. Your organization can also add fields that appear on every Patrol Type, which makes standard reporting across all your Patrols easier.
• A quick summary of your Patrols
  In EarthRanger Web, summary cards give you a quick overview of your Patrol activity.
• One Patrol from start to finish 
  Plans often change in the field. Someone may join the team, a new team lead may take over, or the team may leave the vehicle and continue on foot. You don’t have to end the Patrol and start a new one. Just update it, and EarthRanger keeps everything together as one Patrol.
• See the bigger picture over time 
  Your Patrol data doesn’t stop being useful once the Patrol ends. With Ecoscope, you can turn it into Patrol reports and dashboards that show trends over weeks, months or years. That helps you plan your Patrol effort and share results with your partners.
• Your existing Patrols stay the same
  Your existing Patrols aren’t affected. You’ll see them in the new layout as a Patrol with a single leg.

Key terms

How to capture better Patrol data 

Add your team before you head out. When the team lead starts the Patrol, they can add everyone going out as team members right away. Team members don’t need to start a Patrol of their own.

Pick your team lead. Your team lead is the person leading the Patrol and the one who starts it in EarthRanger Mobile. Being the lead doesn’t mean they’re the only one tracked: any team member with tracking turned on is tracked too.l.

Make sure everyone has tracking turned on. Before heading out, team members need to turn on tracking in EarthRanger Mobile or carry a tracking device. If tracking isn’t on, their movement won’t be recorded as part of the Patrol.

Check how far your Patrol went. By default, the Distance card in your Patrol summary shows the total distance covered by each leg’s lead. If a leg has no lead, it uses the team member or asset that went the furthest on that leg instead. To see how far a specific person or asset went, select them from the dropdown on the Distance card.

Add your equipment. Adding the vehicles, radios, drones or other assets your team takes out gives you a clearer picture of the resources used on each Patrol.

Fill in your organization’s field. If your organization has added its own fields, like transport type or Patrol mandate, you’ll fill those in at the same time.

Update the Patrol as things change. If your team switches from vehicle to foot, or a new team lead takes over, just update the Patrol. Everything stays together as one Patrol from start to finish. Operations room staff can also make the update for your team, for example after a radio check-in.

Before you start

Your site administrator needs to set up a few things before your team can use the new Patrols:

• Patrol Types and custom fields are set up in the Patrol form editor. You can find it in the admin under Activity > Patrol Types and Segments.Patrol fields support the same field types as Event Types, except Collections and Attachments, which aren’t available yet.
• The team members and assets: In your site’s Patrol configuration, choose the groups of people available as team members and the groups of equipment available as assets.

Don't see these options yet? Contact your site administrator or EarthRanger support.

Next steps

Here's a quick look at how a Patrol comes together in ER Web:

1. Start your Patrol. Choose the Patrol Type, add your team members and team lead, add any equipment, and fill in your organization's fields.
2. Update it along the way. If the team, team lead or Patrol Type changes, update the Patrol to keep everything in one place.
3. Review and correct it later. Each Patrol has an overview of its details and activity. You can edit it if something needs fixing, and the History tab shows any changes made.

For step-by-step instructions, see Create and Manage Patrols in EarthRanger Web