View as a webpage / Share

Volume 25 — Issue 6 | February 13, 2025

Lessons learned from wildland fire operations in 2024

The Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center (LLC) has released its Annual Incident Review Summary and Year End Infographic for 2024.

The Annual Incident Review Summary is based on more than 196 wildland fire incident reports and lessons shared with the LLC in 2024. The Year End Infographic is a 2-page snapshot of the 2024 fire year. It highlights selected lessons learned and provides summary statistics on reported fatalities, near miss incidents, and injuries.

The information in these two documents may be used to inform wildland fire training and discussion and prepare for the 2025 fire year.

The LLC’s blog discusses the findings in greater detail. Each of the following articles has links to several incident reports from 2024 that relate to the type of injury or fatality discussed.

• Jan. 17 - 2024 Year End Infographic: Wildland Fire Fatalities.
• Feb. 4 - 2024 Year End Infographic: Heavy Equipment & Driving-Related Incidents.
• Feb. 10 - 2024 Year End Infographic: Entrapments & Burn Injuries.

The Annual Incident Review Summary and Year End Infographic are available on the LLC’s website.

(Source: Wildland Fire Lessons Learned Center)

Highlights

Lessons learned from wildland fire operations in 2024

Restoring flow of private sector lifelines: Grocery sector and distribution center operations

SAMHSA releases new behavioral crisis care guidance and opioid overdose reversal planning toolkit

Webinar: NERIS in Action – Operational Usage and the Road Ahead

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.

Restoring flow of private sector lifelines: Grocery sector and distribution center operations

In disasters, restoring community lifelines and developing contingency solutions is a critical role for emergency managers. Because the private sector manages immense capacity every day, actions by emergency managers to restore the flow of this capacity is a key component of response and recovery.

Developing relationships to understand private sector operations and information needs will pay dividends when disasters hit.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) will host a webinar on Thursday, Feb. 27, at 1 p.m., Restoring Flow of Private Sector Lifelines: Grocery Sector and Distribution Center Operations.

The grocery industry manages the food, beverages and household supplies supporting communities every day. This daily capacity far exceeds what the government and nonprofit organizations can provide during disasters using temporary distribution networks.

This webinar will feature the screening of a new video, FEMA Field Notes: An Introduction to Grocery Distribution Centers, and a Q&A session with C&S Grocers.

This webinar is part of FEMA’s Community of Practice Webinar Series. The webinar is open to all state, local, tribal, and territorial emergency managers, private sector liaisons as well as private sector representatives in the grocery sector.

Learn more and register for this webinar on Zoom.

(Source: FEMA)

SAMHSA releases new behavioral crisis care guidance and opioid overdose reversal planning toolkit

On Jan. 15, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) released new National Behavioral Health Crisis Care Guidance (National Guidance).

The launch of the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline in 2022 catalyzed a rapid expansion of crisis services around the country. SAMHSA identified the need for ongoing guidance for states, tribes, territories, and other local partners to provide the needed oversight, integration, and sustainability to care for people throughout and after a crisis episode.

SAMHSA identifies three essential elements of a behavioral health crisis system: crisis call lines, mobile crisis response, and emergency and crisis stabilization services. These elements work together to improve outcomes for individuals and families while reducing reliance on emergency departments and law enforcement for the care of those with urgent or emergent behavioral health needs.

The National Guidance consists of three documents:

• 2025 National Guidelines for a Behavioral Health Coordinated System of Crisis Care.
• Model Definitions for Behavioral Health Emergency, Crisis, and Crisis-Related Services.
• Mobile Crisis Team Services: An Implementation Toolkit (draft open for public comment through March 21, 2025).

Emergency medical services (EMS), 911 telecommunications, and law enforcement have roles in a crisis care system. Communities aiming to implement or improve their behavioral crisis care systems will benefit from this guidance.

On Jan. 17, SAMHSA released a Community Opioid Overdose Reversal Medications (OORMs) Planning Toolkit. The toolkit provides guidance for community leaders, public health professionals, first responders (including EMS and law enforcement), to create effective overdose prevention and response strategies to improve local overdose reduction outcomes. 

Access the National Guidance, OORMS Toolkit and learn more about how to submit written comments on the draft Mobile Crisis Toolkit at SAMHSA.gov. Comments are due by Friday, March 21, 2025, at 11:59 p.m. ET.

(Source: SAMHSA)

Webinar: NERIS in Action – Operational Usage and the Road Ahead

The Fire Safety Research Institute (FSRI), part of UL Research Institutes, will be hosting a webinar on Tuesday, Feb. 18, from 1-2 p.m. EDT, NERIS in Action: Operational Usage and the Road Ahead.

This event marks a major milestone in the rollout of the National Emergency Response Information System (NERIS), transitioning from development to national deployment. The webinar will explore the path to nationwide NERIS adoption, including the critical steps departments must take before the sunsetting of the legacy system. There will be a live Q&A featuring questions straight from company officers in the field.

The session will cover:

• Practical Guidance: Understand how NERIS fits into daily operations and what it means for your department.
• Transition Roadmap: Hear about key milestones and find out how departments can stay on track for 2026.
• Straightforward Q&A: No fluff—just candid answers from the NERIS team and real-world feedback from the field.
• New Resources: Onboarding materials and resources for your team.

Learn more and register at FSRI.org.

(Source: FSRI)

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

CISA and FBI warn of malicious cyber actors using buffer overflow vulnerabilities to compromise software

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have released a Secure by Design Alert, Eliminating Buffer Overflow Vulnerabilities, as part of their cooperative Secure by Design Alert series—an ongoing series aimed at advancing industry-wide best practices to eliminate entire classes of vulnerabilities during the design and development phases of the product lifecycle. “Eliminating Buffer Overflow Vulnerabilities” describes proven techniques to prevent or mitigate buffer overflow vulnerabilities through secure by design principles and best practices.

Buffer overflow vulnerabilities are a prevalent type of defect in memory-safe software design that can lead to system compromise. These vulnerabilities can lead to data corruption, sensitive data exposure, program crashes, and unauthorized code execution. Threat actors frequently exploit these vulnerabilities to gain initial access to an organization’s network and then move laterally to the wider network.

(Source: CISA)

Cyberattack disrupts Lee newspapers' operations across the US

Lee Enterprises, one of the largest newspaper groups in the United States, says a cyberattack that hit its systems caused an outage last week and impacted its operations.

In a Friday filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the company said the February 3 cyberattack was behind the outage that impacted its business operations.

Lee Enterprises newsrooms have reported that the cyberattack forced the company to shut down many of its networks, disrupting the printing and delivery of dozens of newspapers.

BleepingComputer has also learned that the resulting outage has caused chaos across the newspaper group, with VPNs used to connect securely to the network not working and reporters and editors unable to access their files.

(Source: Bleeping Computer)

New LiDAR system can ID a face a kilometer away

LiDAR has been around since the 1960s and uses laser pulses to measure distance with great accuracy. The new study, led by Edinburgh’s Heriot-Watt University with scientists drawn from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, MIT, and the University of Glasgow, added something that could obtain highly detailed 3D data from up to one kilometer away.

As reported in Popular Mechanics, the creation uses an ultra-sensitive sensor called the superconducting nanowire single-photon detector (SNSPD). The system, co-developed by NASA and MIT, can trace a single photon to an accuracy of 13 picoseconds (13 trillionths of a second). It can also see through fog and smoke and could have many applications including security, monitoring and remote sensing.

(Source: Biometric Update)

Cyberattack temporarily disrupts computer operations at REMSA Health

A recent cyberattack temporarily disrupted computer operations at REMSA Health, but it has since been restored.

REMSA says the attack disrupted its Computer-Aided Dispatch (CAD) system which provides supplementary support to emergency medical dispatchers and telephone services - but those systems were not affected.

"As a result, patient care for the 9-1-1 ground ambulance and Care Flight air ambulance system was never adversely impacted and patient care was not delayed at any time. Other components of REMSA Health’s operations were not affected by this issue," says Alexia Jobson, director of public relations, REMSA Health.

The agency says the CAD is back up and running.

(Source: 2 News Nevada)

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

Fair Use Notice:
This InfoGram may contain copyrighted material that was not specifically authorized by the copyright owner. The EMR-ISAC believes this constitutes “fair use” of copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use copyrighted material contained within this document for your own purposes that go beyond “fair use,” you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.

Linking Policy and Disclaimer of Endorsement:
The appearance of external hyperlinks does not constitute endorsement of the linked websites, or the information, products or services contained therein. We provide these links and pointers solely for your information and convenience. When you select a link to an outside website, remember that you are subject to the privacy and security policies of the owners/sponsors of the outside website. To view information and resources on the policies that govern FEMA web content visit FEMA Website Information.

Section 504 Notice:
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act requires that FEMA grantees provide access to information for people with disabilities. If you need assistance accessing information or have any concerns about access, please contact FEMAWebTeam@fema.dhs.gov.