For Immediate Release
DHS Science and Technology Press Office
Contact: Gwen Bausmith, (202) 254-2296
WASHINGTON – The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) First Responders Group (FRG) invites members of the private sector, academia, laboratories, and the innovation community to attend an industry day on Thursday, March 23, 2017, in Washington, DC.
The event will offer a forum for attendees to learn about first responder capability gaps and opportunities to partner with DHS to rapidly develop technology solutions.
FRG staff will also provide overviews of technical topic areas that will be included in a new Broad Agency Announcement solicitation (HSHQDC-13-R-B0012) that will open in mid-April.
Some of the goals of the upcoming solicitation will be to:
• Increase situational awareness via real-time incident management tools;
• Protect wildland firefighters from exposure to environmental toxins and particulates;
• Integrate public data feeds with an alerting system to inform emergency responder decision making and resource allocation;
• Design energy-harvesting smart fabric technology for first responder uniforms;
• Develop an emergency vehicle navigation system that makes risk-based route calculations based on available traffic and transit data;
• Develop early warning systems to alert both responders and civilians to emergency vehicles approaching incident scenes; and
• Arm bomb squads with a multi-mission disrupter system to support land or water operations, as well as a multi-meter wire attack kit to increase bomb technician performance.
Industry Day attendees will have opportunities to ask questions of program managers and interact with members of the First Responder Resource Group—representatives of all response disciplines who inform FRG’s research and development efforts.
“We’re looking for innovative companies that are able to rapidly develop technologies—the best of the best,” said Greg Price, Director of FRG’s First Responder Technologies division. “We're on a twelve to eighteen month development cycle, so we need companies that are inspired, that have bright thoughts, bright people, and can develop the types of technologies we're looking for.”
To register and for event details, go to http://www.cvent.com/d/svqv4y.
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