Keep tabs on mates with app

SCHOOLIES have embraced an app designed to keep track of friends at festivals.

The SearchParty app was developed by Gold Coast brothers Jesse and Jade Mulholland after last year’s tragic spate of deaths at festivals.

The app is designed to enable friends to see their friends’ locations and to seek medical attention or other help in a crisis. Jade said personal experience inspired its creation.

“My brother and I attend a lot of music festivals and we would lose friends, so it is always a problem to track down your friends with your phone not working properly due to network congestion so we thought let’s solve this … through technology,” he said.

The GPS tracking app allows friends to create their own “party” and uses low latency architecture so it still works when other applications, such as Messenger or trying to call someone, fail.

Joshua Tam, 22, died after taking MDMA and losing his friends at the Paradise music festival on the NSW Central Coast on December 29 last year. Alexandra Ross-King also lost her friends on January 12 at the FOMO music festival in Parramatta. She died from complications of MDMA toxicity. Earlier intervention could have saved their lives.

“We can find people down to a metre accuracy,” Jade said.

The app also has an alert button to directly call emergency services or friends when assistance is required.

“Drug use is commonplace at festivals and even more people are affected by alcohol, heat stroke and dehydration. We can’t stop people from taking drugs, but we wanted to make festivals safer,” Jade said.