ShadeShift
A heat-safety companion for outdoor event attendees that flags dangerous conditions in real time, locates cooling stations, schedules hydration breaks, and tells you when to leave.
festival-goers, parade attendees, and families at outdoor July 4th events
- Live heat-index alerts with personalized risk score based on age, medications, and pregnancy
- AR map of nearby shade, water stations, cooling tents, and rideshares home
- Smart break scheduler that pushes gentle 'go inside now' nudges when WBGT crosses safe thresholds
- Family group mode that shares location and check-ins when a member has been stationary too long
The 2026 US heat dome forced a major federal event to close mid-day and sent a record number of heat-illness cases to DC EMS, exposing how unprepared both organizers and attendees are.
2026 DC July 4th event saw record heat-illness EMS calls and the federal celebration faced 100°F; Coachella area logged 204 heat-related ER visits last festival season, confirming real consumer pain.Brutal heat cancels Fourth of July events in DC and Philadelphia ↗Coachella attendees battle 'health hazard' heat ↗
The OSHA-NIOSH Heat Safety Tool is an official CDC/NIOSH iOS app with real-time heat index, hourly forecasts, and safety recommendations — a strong, free direct competitor in the core heat-alert functionality.OSHA-NIOSH Heat Safety Tool - App Store ↗Heat Safety Tool App (OSHA-NIOSH) | CDC ↗
The dominant reference product is free and government-backed; consumer willingness to pay for a seasonal/occasional-use safety app is weak, and no premium heat-safety consumer app surfaced in search.OSHA-NIOSH Heat Safety Tool - App Store ↗
Climate change is structurally intensifying heat waves (Wikipedia documents 2026 North American heat wave as a named event), giving a multi-decade tailwind, though the use case is seasonal and event-bounded.2026 North American heat wave - Wikipedia ↗
Heat index and forecast data is available via NOAA/NWS APIs and a real-time alert layer is straightforward, but cooling-station mapping, crowd-aware event context, and organizer data partnerships are non-trivial dependencies.Outdoor Event Weather Safety: Wind, Lightning & Heat Guide ↗