In This Article
New Jersey Publicly Releases Its Annual Terrorism Threat Assessment
Yesterday the New Jersey Office of Homeland Security and Preparedness (NJOHSP) publicly released a report entitled “Terrorism Threat Assessment 2016”, a detailed assessment of the current terrorism threat in the state of New Jersey. The report is a solid analysis of the different dimensions of the terrorist threat to the state; it concludes that homegrown violent extremists pose the greatest threat to the state. Security Insights >>
Chemical Unit Trains to Respond to Stateside Emergencies
Disoriented and yelling, a man stumbled up to a group of masked, suited-up people begging for help. In this training scenario, the man had just been exposed to a nuclear explosion. The people in the white protective suits – Fort Bragg soldiers specially trained to respond to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear emergencies – calmly scanned the man with a wand to determine if he had been exposed. Fay Observer >>
Proof of Concept Achieved for Sealed Source Radwaste Disposal Method
The IAEA has announced that successful tests of a “promising technology” for moving and storing low-level radioactive sealed sources are “paving the way” for a new disposal method for dealing with small volumes of radioactive waste around the world. The proof of concept for the technology was tested in Croatia late last year without the use of actual radioactive material. World Nuclear News >>
Mining Social Media Improves Disaster Response Efforts
Leveraging publicly available social media posts could help disaster response agencies quickly identify impacted areas in need of assistance, according to a team of researchers. By analyzing the September 2013 Colorado floods, researchers showed that a combination of remote sensing, Twitter and Flickr data could be used to identify flooded areas. HSNW >>
3 Questions for a Leader in Technology for Disaster Response
Bharania has volunteered with the American Red Cross since he was 18, but he didn’t see the intersection disaster response has with his career in networking and information security until he started with Cisco. Devex spoke with Bharania about the role of tech companies in disaster response, the refugee crisis and what he’s learned. Here is an excerpt from that interview. DevExImpact >>
Sam Nunn on the Nuclear Security Index and Slowing Progress on Safeguarding Nuclear Materials
Back in 2010, US President Barack Obama launched the Nuclear Security Summit process, a series of high-level global meetings aimed at locking down or eliminating loose nuclear materials. Many of the 47 countries that attended made and fulfilled pledges to reduce their stockpiles, but there was no universal measuring stick to evaluate where they stood or how they progressed. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists >>
Radiological Emergency Exercise Tests 53 Countries’ Capacity to Respond
A woman wearing a blue vest with the words Liaison Officer on its back picks up the phone and dials a number. “This is an exercise, this is an exercise,” she says in Spanish. “The IAEA has been informed by the Mexican authorities that a radioactive source from a hospital in the Northern Mexican city of Tijuana has been stolen. IAEA >>