AMU Emergency Management Public Safety

EDM Thursday Briefing: FAA Grants UPS First Certification for Drone Delivery Flights

By
drone Arsenault

Emergency and disaster management briefing for October 3, 2019: Students in Miami have been arrested for allegedly threatening a school on social media; the FAA issues the first full Part 135 certification to UPS for drone delivery flights; Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary settled out of court for over $20 million in an opioid lawsuit with two Ohio counties; prolonged monsoon rains in India are being blamed for the deaths of over 1,600 people; one person is dead and 10 people have been injured in a sword-style weapon attack at a college in Finland; 16 students at a school in Indiana were mistakenly injected with insulin during a tuberculosis test; four people are dead after an arch bridge collapse in Nanfangao, Taiwan, that left two missing and at least 10 others injured; and Hurricane Lorenzo is rapidly moving away from the Azores and is expected to hit Ireland sometime Thursday.

Start an Emergency & Disaster Management degree at American Military University.

1) Two students were arrested in Miami after allegedly threatening a school on social media. Multiple social media threats led to the arrest of at least two students, aged 13 and 14, who attend the Howard D. Miller Middle School, a magnet school, in West Kendall. Additional police officers were assigned to the school on Tuesday as a precaution as authorities worked to determine other students involved in the social media threats against the school.

2) The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) granted UPS the first full Part 135 certification — a certification used by charter airlines — to operate a drone delivery fleet. The certification allows the operation of drones without limits on its size or scope of operations, including loads that exceed 55 pounds, along with the ability to fly drones at night and out of the sight of operators. Its first flight under the new certification was the delivery of medical supplies to the WakeMed hospital campus in Raleigh, North Carolina.

3) Opioid manufacturer Johnson & Johnson, along with its pharmacy subsidiary, Janssen, settled a lawsuit with two counties in Ohio to avoid a federal trial over the opioid addiction epidemic. The company agreed to pay over $20 million to Cuyahoga and Summit counties without the admission of liability, which removes them from the federal trial set to begin this month. Lawsuits filed in Ohio, Oklahoma, and other states accuse Johnson & Johnson and its subsidiary of allegedly pushing doctors to prescribe opioids while downplaying the high risk of addiction to the painkillers.

4) Monsoon rains that have lashed India since June are being blamed for the deaths of over 1,600 people. Rainfall amounts are 10 percent above the 50-year average for the country and are expected to last a month longer than normal into the month of October. The Uttar Pradesh and Bihar states have been the hardest hit. Floodwaters have trapped people in their homes for days, destroyed about 800 houses, collapsed walls of buildings and flooded farmland.

5) One person was killed and 10 others injured, including two people seriously, when a man in his mid-twenties attacked them with a sword-like weapon at a college in Kuopio, Finland. The incident occurred on Tuesday. The suspect, who was shot and wounded by police, allegedly also had a gun but it is unclear if the weapon was used. Police said that a fire on the second floor of the shopping center — where the college was located — was deliberately set. A search of the suspect’s home revealed unused petrol bombs.

6) Sixteen students from the Metropolitan School District of Lawrence Township in Indianapolis, Indiana, were mistakenly injected with insulin during a tuberculosis test. Following the incident, the injected students were taken to a nearby hospital for monitoring; it is unclear how the error occurred or why the TB test was being administered to the students.  The TB test was administered by Community Health Network personnel, and a investigation into the error is underway.

7) An arched bridge collapse in Nanfangao, Taiwan, on Tuesday morning left four people dead and at least two people missing. A oil tanker truck that was on the bridge when it collapsed crash-landed onto three fishing boats in the water below, sparked a fire, and seriously injured the driver and nine workers on the boats. The Nanfangao Bridge collapsed just hours after a typhoon swept through the area, but authorities are uncertain if that played a part in the bridge collapse.

8) Hurricane Lorenzo is rapidly moving away from the Azores and is set to make landfall in Ireland sometime Thursday. The hurricane — which had briefly intensified to a Category 5 storm — has weakened to a Category 1 with maximum sustained winds of 90 mph and is expected to weaken further before it makes landfall in Ireland. Hurricane Lorenzo is also being blamed for the sinking of a tugboat carrying 14 people late last week, but search and rescue teams found three survivors in a life raft on Saturday. The bodies of three others have also been found by rescue crews.

 

Kimberly Arsenault serves as an intern at the Cleveland/Bradley County Emergency Management Agency where she works on plan revisions and special projects. Previously, Kimberly spent 15 years in commercial and business aviation. Her positions included station manager at the former Midwest Express Airlines, as well as corporate flight attendant, inflight manager, and charter flight coordinator. Kimberly currently holds a master's degree in emergency and disaster management from American Public University.

Related Posts

Comments are closed.