The Team Awareness Kit (TAK) provides Fire, Emergency Management, and First Responders an operationally agnostic tool for improved situational awareness and a common operational picture.
TAK.NZ provides multiple repos to deploy TAK infrastructure on AWS. These repos are based on the work of the Colorado Centre of Excellence for Advanced Technology Aerial Firefighting, the driving force behind COTAK - Colorado’s free real-time location service for emergency responders.
The TAK infrastructure is provided through multiple layers, each in a distinct GitHib repo. Layers can be deployed in multiple independent environments. As an example:
PRODUCTION ENVIRONMENT . DEMO ENVIRONMENT . DEVELOPMENT ENVIRONMENT
Domain: tak.nz . Domain: preview.tak.nz . Domain: dev.tak.nz
Deployed via CI/CD . Deployed via CI/CD . Deployed manually
. .
┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐
│ UtilsInfra │ . │ UtilsInfra │ . │ UtilsInfra │
│ │ . │ │ . │ │
└──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘
│ . │ . │
▼ . ▼ . ▼
┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐
│ MediaInfra │ . │ MediaInfra │ . │ MediaInfra │
│ │ . │ │ . │ │
└──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘
│ . │ . │
▼ . ▼ . ▼
┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ . ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐
│ CloudTAK │ │ Team Manager │ . │ CloudTAK │ │ Team Manager │ . │ CloudTAK │ │ Team Manager │
│ │ │ │ . │ │ │ │ . │ │ │ │
└──────────────┘ └──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘ └──────────────┘ . └──────────────┘ └──────────────┘
│ │ │ . │ │ │ . │ │ │
▼ ▼ │ . ▼ ▼ │ . ▼ ▼ │
┌─────────────────────────┐ │ . ┌─────────────────────────┐ │ . ┌─────────────────────────┐ │
│ TakInfra │ │ . │ TakInfra │ │ . │ TakInfra │ │
│ │ │ . │ │ │ . │ │ │
└─────────────────────────┘ │ . └─────────────────────────┘ │ . └─────────────────────────┘ │
│ │ . │ │ . │ │
▼ ▼ . ▼ ▼ . ▼ ▼
┌─────────────────────────────────┐ . ┌─────────────────────────────────┐ . ┌─────────────────────────────────┐
│ AuthInfra │ . │ AuthInfra │ . │ AuthInfra │
│ │ . │ │ . │ │
└─────────────────────────────────┘ . └─────────────────────────────────┘ . └─────────────────────────────────┘
│ . │ . │
▼ . ▼ . ▼
┌─────────────────────────────────┐ . ┌─────────────────────────────────┐ . ┌─────────────────────────────────┐
│ BaseInfra │ . │ BaseInfra │ . │ BaseInfra │
│ │ . │ │ . │ │
└─────────────────────────────────┘ . └─────────────────────────────────┘ . └─────────────────────────────────┘
| Layer | Description | Status | CI/CD pipeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| BaseInfra | Foundation: VPC, ECS, S3, KMS, ACM | ✅ Available |   |
| AuthInfra | SSO via Authentik, LDAP | ✅ Available |   |
| TAKInfra | TAK Server | ✅ Available |   |
| Team Manager | Manage TAK orgs & teams, users, devices, and channels | ✅ Available |   |
| CloudTAK | CloudTAK web interface, ETL | ✅ Available |   |
| MediaInfra | Media Streaming | ✅ Available |   |
| UtilsInfra | Various utility functions | ✅ Available |   |
Deployment Order: BaseInfra must be deployed first, followed by AuthInfra, TakInfra, Team Manager, CloudTAK, and finally MediaInfra. Each layer imports outputs from layers below via CloudFormation exports.
Each stacks is provided in a Prod type with full resiliency built-in and a Dev-Test type with reduced resiliency for optimized cost.
TAK.NZ uses CloudTAK's ETL capabilities to extract, transform and load 3rd party data into the TAK ecosystem. The following ETL are currently in use:
| ETL | Description | Data Source | Availability | CI/CD pipeline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ETL-ArcGIS | Any ArcGIS data from ESRI Feature and MapServer | Department of Conservation | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-ADSBX | Aircraft location data via Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) | ADSBExchange.com | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-AISHub | Vessel locations based on automatic identification system (AIS) data | aisstream.io | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-Avalanche | NZ Avalanche Advisory (NZAA) risk data | New Zealand Avalanche Centre | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-CAPNZ | Alerts via Common Alerting Protocol (CAP-NZ) | MetService Weather Warnings, Civil Defense Emergency Mobile Alert | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-FIRMS | Satellite based fire detection with land cover masking and fire season awareness | NASA FIRMS, Manaaki Whenua / Landcare Research, Fire and Emergency NZ (FENZ) | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-FloodHub | Riverine and flash flood predictions | Google Flood Hub | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-GeoNet-Quakes | Earthquake epicenter locations | GeoNet New Zealand | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-GeoNet-VolcanoCams | Volcano cameras | GeoNet New Zealand | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-GeoJSON | Any GeoJSON data from an HTTP(S) endpoint | NZ Transport Agency Waka Kotahi, GeoNet New Zealand | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-InReach | Garmin InReach satellite messenger tracking | Garmin InReach | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-SafeSwim | Beach water quality and lifeguard patrol status | Safeswim | ✅ Available |  |
| ETL-WLG-Metlink | Wellington Metlink vehicle locations | Metlink Open Data | ✅ Available |  |
TAK.NZ uses the following plugins to extend the functionality of CloudTAK:
| Plugin | Description | Availability |
|---|---|---|
| Live Weather | Overlay current precipitation, clouds or rain radar onto your digital map. | ✅ |
| Rubbersheets | Use a photo or PDF, georectify it, and overlay it directly onto your digital map. | ✅ |
| SAR travel time | Terrain-aware search and rescue range rings and travel-time isochrones for New Zealand. | ✅ |
TAK.NZ provides custom iconsets based on New Zealand standards:
| Iconset | Description | Standard | Availability |
|---|---|---|---|
| GEMA NZEM Symbology Set | Emergency management symbols for TAK | GEMA New Zealand Emergency Management | ✅ |
| Public Safety Vessels Symbology Set | Custom TAK iconset for public safety vessels used in New Zealand emergency management operations | ✅ | |
| Safeswim | A custom TAK iconset for Safeswim beach water quality and lifeguard patrol status | ✅ |
TAK.NZ CloudTAK web based TAK client interface. Various real-time data imported with CloudTAK Extract/Transform/Load (ETL) functions are displayed.
TAK.NZ is distributed under AGPL-3.0-only
Copyright (C) 2025-2026 - Christian Elsen, Team Awareness Kit New Zealand (TAK.NZ)