The collaboration between TCC—the regional nonprofit organization representing forty-two Interior Alaska Native tribes—and UAF researchers is supported by the National Science Foundation. The Alaska NSF Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research aims to gather information about vegetation regrowth in village firebreaks and about how fires along rivers could influence salmon habitat and growth rates. "I want us to co-produce research that helps TCC advocate for the interests of their communities and helps them make smart, timely and adaptive decisions with regard to wildfire and to resilience to wildfire," says EPSCoR researcher Todd Brinkman, a UAF associate professor of wildlife ecology. "They've got a better handle on what's important to their communities than we do." The firebreak research began in May 2020, when TCC Forester Fabian Keirn traveled to the communities of Dot Lake, Tanacross, and Tetlin, all of which have had preventive firebreaks put in over the last twenty years.  

VIDEO: A female FDNY EMT was assaulted at the scene of a three-alarm fire in the Bronx that damaged seven businesses. The fire broke out on Westchester Avenue in the Parkchester section just before 6:30 a.m. Thursday, right near the elevated subway tracks. The fire appears to have started in a 99-cent store. While no one was injured in the fire, an FDNY EMT was assaulted at the scene. Heavy smoke spread over the neighborhood and across an adjacent elevated subway line, where passing trains were slowed. FDNY Chief of EMS Operations Lillian Bonsignore released a statement calling the incident, "unbelievable and despicable." "We are out here ready to save the lives of the people who depend on us, out in the freezing cold while our firefighters are fighting this fire," she said. Bonsignore says the female EMT was flagged down by someone who said they were in need of help. The 32-year-old EMT saw the man collapsing on the sidewalk.  

VIDEO: One NASA Kennedy Space Center firefighter went above and beyond in his rescue back in October. A broken scaffolding left a team of painters hanging on the side of the Vehicle Assembly Building at Kennedy Space Center. The painters were dangling 375-feet above ground while painting the flag on the VAB. They had already been stuck a couple of hours when Kennedy Fire Rescue got the alert. Firefighter Andrew Morgan scaled down to the rescue once he reached the scaffolding, strapped one of the men to his body and the two were hauled to the roof.  

The Bourne Fire Department has been selected to take part in a nationwide program with a goal of building a digital tool that will share information on community risk factors. Assistant Fire Chief David S. Pelonzi announced that Bourne Fire/Rescue and Emergency Services was selected by the National Fire Protection Association to participate in the second phase of the pilot program. The program focuses on the concept of community risk reduction, or CRR. CRR is a process that identifies and prioritizes risks and ensures impactful mitigation initiatives, Asst. Chief Pelonzi said. The idea has been gaining traction across North America for more than 20 years, he said. "NFPA's CRR tool works to help fire departments aggregate and disseminate data that pinpoint where risks exist within a given community," the assistant chief said.  

Scientists around the world are on the lookout for new COVID-19 variants, which are caused by mutations of the virus when its replication machinery makes an error. Experts say these mutations and the new variants are normal and to be expected. In recent months, so-called variants of concern have been identified in the U.K., South Africa, Brazil and in the U.S. And it's not a coincidence they're appearing in these countries, which have been overwhelmed by the sheer number of COVID-19 cases. Finding variants by screening COVID-19-infected patients with genomic sequencing is the easy part. The difficult part is then figuring out what these mutations mean. Researchers are studying the variants daily to gain a better understanding of their differences. While we still don't know a lot about how the mutations in these variants change the virus, we do have evidence that some might be more transmissible.  

When we need help, first responders are the ones who answer the call. Firefighters, EMTs, and police officers put their health and lives at risk every day to serve those in their community. During the pandemic, those risks have only become more pronounced as first responders venture into dozens of homes each week, many of them for COVID-19-related calls. "This last year, we had a lot of growing pains together, and from those growing pains came this really positive light that we can get through it together," said Cpt. Brac Heiss with the Denver Fire Department. Cpt. Heiss has been with the Denver Fire Department for 15 years. It comes as no surprise that some of his career's biggest challenges have come since last March. "Everybody is a potential COVID patient now. Everybody is presumptive COVID positive until they're not," he said.