Agencies

FEMA Authorizes Funds to Fight Utah’s Monroe Fire

Published: 17 July 2025
Categories: FEMA News

RSS feed source: Federal Emergency Management Agency

DENVER – This afternoon FEMA authorized the use of federal funds to help with firefighting costs for the Monroe Fire burning in Sevier County, Utah. The fire started July 13, 2025 and is 0-percent contained.  

Acting FEMA Region 8 Administrator Katherine Fox approved the state’s request for a federal Fire Management Assistance Grant (FMAG) this afternoon after determining the fire threatened such destruction that it would constitute a major disaster.

At the time of the request, the fire had burned 8000 acres and was threatening critical infrastructure including essential communications as well as the local watershed. There are also several other large fires burning uncontrolled within the state of Utah and fire weather conditions remain a concern. 

The authorization makes FEMA funding available to pay 75 percent of the state’s eligible firefighting costs under an approved grant for managing, mitigating and controlling designated fires. These grants do not provide assistance to individual home or business owners and do not cover other infrastructure damage caused by the fire.

Fire Management Assistance Grants are provided through the President’s Disaster Relief Fund and are made available by FEMA to assist in fighting fires that threaten to cause a major disaster. Eligible items can include expenses for field camps; equipment use, repair and replacement; mobilization and demobilization activities; and tools, materials and supplies. 

For more information on FMAGs, visit  https://www.fema.gov/fire-management-assistance-grants-program-details.

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New AI model could revolutionize U.S manufacturing

Published: 17 July 2025
Categories: National Science Foundation

RSS feed source: Federal Emergency Management Agency

Artificial intelligence has transformed fields like medicine and finance, but it hasn’t gained much traction in manufacturing. Factories present a different challenge for AI: They are structured, fast-paced environments that rely on precision and critical timing. Success requires more than powerful algorithms; it demands deep, real-time understanding of complex systems, equipment and workflow. A new AI model designed specifically for manufacturing, seeks to address this challenge and revolutionize how factories operate.

With support from the U.S. National Science Foundation, a team led by California State University Northridge’s Autonomy Research Center for STEAHM has developed MaVila — short for Manufacturing, Vision and Language — an intelligent assistant that combines image analysis and natural language processing to help manufacturers detect problems, suggest improvements and communicate with machines in real time. Their goal is to create smarter, more adaptive manufacturing systems that can better support one of the most important sectors of the U.S. economy.

MaVila takes a different approach. Instead of relying on outside data, like information on the internet, it is trained with manufacturing-specific knowledge from the start. It learns directly from visual and language-based data in factory settings. The tool can “see” and “talk” — analyzing images of parts, describing defects in plain language, suggesting fixes and even communicating with machines to carry out automatic adjustments.

MaVila was trained using a specialized approach that required

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Farmers, Ranch Hands May Be Eligible for FEMA Assistance

Published: 16 July 2025
Categories: FEMA News

RSS feed source: Federal Emergency Management Agency

Middle and Western Tennessee farmers and ranch hands whose tools or equipment were damaged by the April 2-24 severe storms, straight-line winds, tornadoes and flooding may be eligible for disaster assistance. FEMA assistance is available to replace disaster-damaged essential tools, supplies, equipment and items required for employment or for self-employment.

Coverage for Tools and Equipment

Family-owned farms typically have a variety of equipment needed to conduct business. These include, but are not limited to, tractors, plows, seeders or planters, harvesters, sprayers, hay balers and utility vehicles. These items are all potentially eligible for FEMA disaster assistance if applicants can show that they were damaged by the disaster, the applicant does not have another working item that can meet this need, and the loss of the item was not covered by insurance. Crops and livestock are not “tools and equipment” because they are the products of a farming operation, whereas tools and equipment are the means of production.

Ranch hands may be eligible for assistance to replace disaster-damaged tools and equipment not covered by insurance when they can show these items are required by their employer. Assistance is based on a need to replace disaster-damaged essential tools, supplies, equipment and items required by an employer as a condition of employment, but NOT provided by the employer.

Many of these items have substantial costs, but it is important

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Voltage Park joins NSF-led National AI Research Resource pilot to expand access to advanced computing

Published: 16 July 2025
Categories: National Science Foundation

RSS feed source: Federal Emergency Management Agency

The U.S. National Science Foundation is proud to announce a new partnership with Voltage Park in support of the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) pilot — a transformative public-private initiative designed to drive U.S. AI innovation, discovery and national competitiveness by expanding access to the tools and resources essential for cutting-edge AI resources for researchers and educators across the country.

Voltage Park, a company committed to broadening access to AI infrastructure, will contribute high-performance cloud computing resources and expert support to help researchers nationwide pursue breakthrough innovations in AI. As part of the partnership, Voltage Park will provide one million NVIDIA H100 GPU hours, enabling a diverse range of AI research projects in science, engineering, health, climate, and more.

“Voltage Park’s participation significantly strengthens our ability to deliver on the promise of the NAIRR pilot,” said Brian Stone, performing the duties of the NSF director. “By partnering with visionary private sector organizations like Voltage Park, we are expanding the frontiers of AI research and ensuring that the US continues to lead in AI innovation.”  

​​​“Expanding access to advanced computing is not just a technical initiative—it’s a strategic priority,” said Ozan Kaya, Chief Executive Officer of Voltage Park. “By lowering the barriers to high-performance AI infrastructure, we can unlock innovation from a more diverse and representative set of researchers. That inclusivity is what drives

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