Sendai City is the center of Tohoku Region, Japan. The coastal areas were devastated by the tsunami caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. The region has come to be recognized internationally through the United Nations as a symbol of disaster risk reduction and reconstruction. With this recent history in mind, Sendai City set forth to build an improved communications and emergency response system that could do a better job of monitoring conditions, alerting the local population and ensuring that they evacuate the affected area. Working with Nokia, Sendai City has successfully tested a private wireless network to support a network of drones for future disaster response.