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Volume 24 — Issue 49 | December 12, 2024

Consumer battery safety during the holiday season

During the winter holiday season, changes in consumer behavior can elevate safety risks - risks that are responsible for more fires and trips to the emergency room than other times of year.

UL Standards & Engagement (ULSE) conducts an annual Holiday Safety Study that examines four areas where activities change the most during the holidays — gifting, decorating, cooking, and traveling.

ULSE’s 2024 Holiday Safety Study found that nearly three-quarters (72%) of those surveyed said they plan to purchase gifts this season. Of those, 83% anticipate buying some type of battery-powered gift. Top items included electronic toys, wireless or Bluetooth headphones, small kitchen appliances, personal care products, smartphones, and tablets.

From cell phones to children’s toys, lithium-ion battery technology powers many of our consumer devices. But many consumers are not aware of how serious the fire and injury risks are when these batteries are faulty, damaged, or mishandled. According to recent testimony to the U.S. House of Representatives related to battery safety, when these batteries burn, the time from the first sign of smoke until thermal runaway or explosion can be as little as 15 seconds.

A faulty or damaged battery can end up costing consumers far more than they bargained for if it leads to a thermal runaway incident. Just last month, a residential garage in Ann Arbor, Michigan, was destroyed by what the fire department suspected was a lawn mower battery that went into thermal runaway. In New Bedford, Massachusetts, a battery for a cordless power tool caught fire in a one-story single dwelling. The homeowner was able to place the lithium-ion battery outside prior to the fire departments’ arrival, but the home still needed to be ventilated due to the smoke from this fire.

Even very small consumer lithium-ion batteries can pose risk of burn injury or fire. Earlier this month, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) reported that it received 33 reports of incidents involving the lithium-ion batteries in just one type of battery-powered Bluetooth speaker, where the battery overheated. Some of those incidents also involved smoking and small fires, including one minor burn injury in connection with an overheating unit.

Counterfeits are a major safety concern, particularly for electronics and battery-powered items. A concerning minority in ULSE’s 2024 survey said they plan to intentionally purchase counterfeit goods (14%) or will consider counterfeit goods if authentic versions are too expensive (18%). Those minority percentages, however, translate to approximately 24 million adults who plan to purchase counterfeit goods and 31 million who will consider them.

Public awareness of these risks is critical to saving lives and drastically reducing property loss. The fire service can help by reporting unsafe products to the CPSC at saferproducts.gov and by sharing battery safety messaging with their community.

The following are excellent, free, shareable resources that can be used to educate the public on consumer battery safety this holiday season:

• U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) - Lithium-ion Battery Safety for Electronic Devices. This one-page flyer summarizes essential battery safety messaging for consumer electronics.
• USFA – Battery Fire Safety. USFA has a collection of copyright-free safety messages, social media graphics, stock photos, and handouts on this page.
• Fire Safety Research Institute (FSRI) – Take C.H.A.R.G.E. of Battery Safety. FSRI’s campaign website, https://batteryfiresafety.org/, has a toolbox for first responders with public service announcement videos, social media shareables, and more.
• ULSE– 2024 Holiday Safety Guide. This guide captures the results of ULSE’s 2024 Holiday Safety Study and provides safety guidance related to holiday gifting, decorating, cooking, and traveling.

Encourage your community to take extra precautions this holiday season to avoid buying counterfeit products and research product authenticity before purchasing. Consumers can see if any products they have purchased are subject to recalls at www.cpsc.gov/recalls. Stay up to date on the latest recalls by subscribing to updates from the CPSC.

(Sources: ULSE, CPSC, USFA, FSRI)

Highlights

Consumer battery safety during the holiday season

New research on the most effective decontamination methods for fentanyl and carfentanil

FEMA updates National Disaster Recovery Framework

FDIC Webcast: Bringing Drones to Fireground Operations, Dec. 19

Cyber Threats

The U.S. Fire Administration operates the Emergency Management and Response – Information Sharing and Analysis Center (EMR-ISAC).

For information regarding the EMR-ISAC visit www.usfa.dhs.gov/emr-isac or contact the EMR-ISAC office at: (301) 447-1325 and/or fema-emr-isac@fema.dhs.gov.

New research on the most effective decontamination methods for fentanyl and carfentanil

The illicit use of fentanyl and its analogues is a serious public health concern due to the potency and wide availability of these substances. Hazardous materials teams must be able to effectively decontaminate fentanyl-contaminated areas and eliminate the risk of further contamination or unintentional exposure to emergency personnel and the public.

A recently published study in Nature presents new data on the most effective decontamination methods for fentanyl and carfentanil.

The findings of this study may be of interest to first responders in law enforcement, emergency medical services, or hazardous materials teams. The study focuses on effective decontamination methods that can minimize the risk of occupational exposure during operationally relevant scenarios, not just in a laboratory.

Because fentanyl and its analogues are highly toxic even in very small amounts, decontamination strategies based on chemical degradation are preferred over those based on physical removal alone.

This study reinforces previous studies showing that oxidative solutions are the most effective at chemical degradation of fentanyl and its analogues. The commercial product Dahlgren Decon was shown to be the most effective oxidative solution in this study. This product degraded fentanyl and carfentanil completely within 10 minutes.

For chemical degradation to be an effective decontamination strategy, the degradation products must be less toxic than the original products. Therefore, the study also investigated the physiological effects of the degradation products created with use of Dahlgren Decon and similar oxidative solutions. The results showed that these degradation products were much less toxic. They were significantly less potent in eliciting a response at the µ-opioid receptor level than fentanyl and carfentanil and they could be metabolized by liver enzymes.

Although Dahlgren Decon is an effective chemical degradation agent for fentanyl and carfentanil, it has several practical disadvantages such as high cost, the viscosity of the solution, accessibility, and ease of use (the three components must be mixed prior to use in the field).

This study explored several alternatives to chemical degradation via oxidative solutions, and it adds new data on dry decontaminants using metal oxides.

The commercial dry decontaminant FAST-ACT (first applied sorbent treatment against chemical threats), which consists of mixed aggregates of magnesium oxide (MgO) and titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanoparticles, was effective at decontamination in this study. Less than 5% of the fentanyl and carfentanil compounds remained after 10 minutes.

Additionally, an in-house synthesized titanium dioxide-based adsorbent was also shown to be effective for removal of fentanyl and carfentanil from solution. Less than 20% of fentanyl and carfentanil remained after 10 minutes.

The study suggests that metal oxide-based dry decontaminants could have potential for decontamination of fentanyl related substances under operationally relevant conditions.

The complete study is available as an open-access article in Nature.

(Source: Nature)

FEMA updates National Disaster Recovery Framework

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) released the third edition of the National Disaster Recovery Framework (NDRF) this week.

The revised framework includes feedback and recommendations from the public during a 30-day public comment period that ended in October 2024.

The NDRF streamlines and clarifies the federal government’s approach to providing disaster recovery resources and support to disaster-impacted communities. It is one of five national planning frameworks for each of the five preparedness mission areas within the National Preparedness System – prevention, protection, mitigation, response, and recovery.

Key revisions include:

• Clarifying roles and responsibilities.
• Detailing the Federal Recovery Support Function structure and its role in supporting local recovery goals.
• Enhancing collaboration across the whole community.
• Providing practical resources to assist in recovery planning efforts.

FEMA encourages states, local governments, Tribal Nations and territories, as well as nonprofits and the emergency management community, to view and use the NDRF as a model to guide and inform their own disaster recovery planning and policymaking. The NDRF is valuable for recovery practitioners at all levels, ranging from full time professionals in state and county emergency management to individuals across the whole recovery community.

Access the third edition of the NDRF and associated Frequently Asked Questions document at FEMA.gov.

(Source: FEMA)

FDIC Webcast: Bringing Drones to Fireground Operations, Dec. 19

The 2025 Fire Department Instructors Conference International (FDIC International) is scheduled to take place April 7-12, 2025.

Fire Engineering magazine is hosting a webcast on Thursday, Dec. 19, at 1 p.m. EST, Bringing Drones to Fireground Operations. This webcast will offer a sneak peak of pre-conference classroom sessions that will be offered at FDIC International at the Indianapolis Fire Training Academy in April 2025.

The webcast focuses on how drones are changing the way firefighters operate and how drones can improve the safety and efficiency of fire service operations. Participants will learn about:

• How drones are used for search and rescue, scene monitoring, and real-time decision-making.
• Success and failure case studies.
• The recent deployment of drones during the 2024 Hurricanes.
• Lessons learned during the long-term deployment of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) platforms.
• Upcoming 2025 drone trends.

At the pre-conference in April, classroom sessions will include live field demonstrations where participants can see drones in action.

Learn more and register for this webcast at FireEngineering.com.

(Source: Fire Engineering)

Cyber Incident Assistance

MS-ISAC
SOC@cisecurity.org
1-866-787-4722

IdentityTheft.gov

IC3

Cybercrime Support Network

General Information

StopRansomware.gov

CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities Catalog

FTC scam list

CISA alerts

Law Enforcement Cyber Center

TLP Information

US sanctions Chinese firm for hacking firewalls in ransomware attacks

On Dec. 10, the U.S. Treasury Department announced that it has sanctioned Chinese cybersecurity company Sichuan Silence and one of its employees for their involvement in a series of Ragnarok ransomware attacks targeting U.S. critical infrastructure companies and many other victims worldwide in April 2020.

According to the Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), Sichuan Silence is a Chengdu-based cybersecurity government contractor (recently profiled by the Natto Thoughts team) that provides products and services to core clients like China's intelligence services.

The company's services include computer network exploitation, brute-force password cracking, email monitoring, and public sentiment suppression.

(Source: Bleeping Computer)

Arkansas City wraps up investigation into cyberattack of water plant

The Arkansas City water treatment plant is fully recovered after a cyber-attack earlier this year, according to city leaders. During the most recent city council meeting, leaders got an update on the investigation into the attack that happened in September. The investigation found that no personal information was compromised during the attack, and drinking water remained safe. The city manager said they are now working on upgrades to protect the plant from future attacks.

(Source: 12 News – Wichita, Kansas)

What were the consequences of the AJH Christmas cyberattack?

On Christmas Day in 2023, Anna Jaques Hospital (AJH), based in Massachusetts, experienced a significant cybersecurity breach orchestrated by the Money Message ransomware cartel. This attack was particularly alarming due to the timing and the extent of the compromised data, which included information on over 316,000 patients and the theft of 600GB of sensitive information. The immediate fallout from this breach was severe, as it resulted in the hospital’s electronic records system being shut down and caused interruptions in their ambulance services during a critical holiday period.

(Source: B2B Daily)

Important information for blood establishments regarding cybersecurity resiliency

Blood collection establishments use computer systems and networks for all steps involved in the manufacture, processing, labeling and distribution of blood and blood components for transfusion or source plasma for further manufacture.

Recent cybersecurity incidents have disrupted healthcare systems and halted blood establishment operations. On Dec. 5, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) provided information to blood establishments, including transfusion services, as a resource for strengthening their cybersecurity practices in order to prevent and mitigate cybersecurity incidents that could affect the availability and safety of blood and blood components for transfusion or further manufacture.

(Source: FDA)

Ransomware sends Ohio county emergency services back to pen and paper

Wood County, Ohio, located about 116 miles west of Cleveland, discovered a ransomware attack in the early morning on Monday, Dec. 9.

The cyberattack disrupted operations at several public safety departments connected to the Wood County Sheriff’s Office computer aided dispatch system, including emergency dispatchers, jails and the Bowling Green Police Division.

In Wood County, which has a population of approximately 130,000 people, emergency dispatchers can take incoming phone calls and communicate with first responders but are using pen and paper to record calls because they cannot access the county’s records management system. Officials in the Bowling Green Police Department are also unable to access some historical police records.

The county’s IT department is working with the FBI and third-party cybersecurity consultants to analyze and test the system, according to a press release issued Tuesday by the Wood County Commissioners’ Office.

(Source: StateScoop)

The InfoGram is distributed weekly to provide members of the Emergency Services Sector with information concerning the protection of their critical infrastructures.

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