Retired Lt. Gen. Todd Semonite, former chief of eEngineers and commanding general of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), is the recipient of the Society of American Military Engineers (SAME) 2023 Golden Eagle Award for National Security.
SAME presented the prestigious award on May 4 to Semonite, president of Federal Programs at WSP USA, a leading engineering, environment and professional services consultancy, during the organization’s annual Joint Engineer Training Conference in San Antonio. The award cites his leadership role in ensuring Americans had reliable access to healthcare facilities during the COVID pandemic in 2020.
In addition, Semonite was announced as one of 26 members newly invested into SAME’s Fellows Academy, which formally acknowledges distinguished individuals for their dedication to SAME and the architecture/engineering/construction profession.
“I am very honored to receive this Golden Eagle award, but it’s not just about me. It’s also about all of the men and women whom I’ve had the pleasure to work with in my career,” Semonite said. “I was in the Army for 41 years and the mission was always about ‘How are we going to take care of America?’ So, whether you’re building barracks or an airfield, supporting soldiers overseas, or directing emergency response operations following a major disaster mission accomplishment is what we do best. The military ethic enabled us to pull people together to find solutions and get things done.”
As USACE commanding general, Semonite advised the Secretary of the Army on general, combat and geospatial engineering; construction, real property, public infrastructure; and natural resources science and management. He also oversaw 36,000 civilian employees, 800 military personnel, and managed a $68 billion project portfolio.
Semonite was leading USACE in February 2020 when the U.S. was on the brink of the COVID pandemic. USACE stepped up to build temporary “alternative care” facilities (field hospitals) in locations around the country, where needed.
Working along with the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the goal was to support local capacity for inpatient and outpatient healthcare services, at a time when many regions were overwhelmed with demand from COVID. After talking with hundreds of governors and mayors, USACE completed 1,100 assessments nationwide and, of those, they designed and built about 70 needed facilities in record time. The first was New York City’s Javits Center. Other converted facilities included sports arenas, hotels, dormitories and vacant hospitals. The result was the creation of over 30,000 additional bed spaces nationwide.
“We, as engineers, filled a void when our nation needed someone to step up,” Semonite said. “While it was never in my mandate, as the head of the USACE, to think about how to solve COVID, there was a problem and somebody had to figure out how to address it. So, we worked together with healthcare professionals, the engineering staff, as well as the industry side, to put these massive facilities together in record time.”
As Chief of Engineers in 2017, Semonite managed USACE’s emergency response operations for three major storms: Hurricane Harvey in Texas; Hurricane Irma, which struck the U.S. Virgin Islands and Florida; and Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico, where he directed rebuilding efforts for three grids, as part of over $1 billion in infrastructure repairs that included installing more than 66,000 power poles. In 2012, as Division Commander of the USACE South Atlantic Division, he coordinated the response to Hurricane Sandy in the Southeast after the devastating storm struck the U.S. East Coast and caused nearly $70 billion in damage.
“I’ve been unbelievably blessed to have a lot of people in my life who have made me successful,” Semonite said. “This is my opportunity to thank the thousands of mentors, peers, soldiers and civilians who have supported me throughout my career and pay that back, by thanking them for that success. I also want to thank my wife Connie, my kids, and my 10 grandchildren for their support.”
A licensed professional engineer in New York, Virginia and Vermont, he has a bachelor’s degree in civil engineering from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York. He also holds a master’s in civil engineering from the University of Vermont, as well as a master’s in military arts from Fort Leavenworth.
His military awards include the three Distinguished Service Medals, the Defense Superior Service Award, five Legion of Merit awards, the Bronze star, the Ranger tab and the Parachutist badge.
A car crashed into the gates of Downing Street in London, the official residence of the UK prime minister, police reported. A video that was broadcast by the BBC, shows a silver car driving at slow speed across Whitehall, the main thoroughfare that passes the end of Downing Street. The car then goes directly toward the wrought-iron gates that prevent public access to the Downing Street which many call the heart of the UK government.
Rishi Sunak, the British Prime Minister, was at Downing Street at the time of the incident. The incident set off a “rapid, intense security response.” However, police said they were not treating the incident as terror-related. No one was injured. The driver of the vehicle was arrested at the scene.
Leidos announced that Thomas Bell has begun his tenure as CEO. Bell’s selection was announced on February 27, 2023.
“Tom comes to Leidos from an impressive global career spanning multiple companies and varied roles of increasing responsibility. Most recently he led Rolls-Royce’s North American business. The Board is confident that Tom is the right leader for the company and will quickly earn the trust of all our stakeholders,” said Robert S. Shapard, who assumed the role of independent Chairman of the Board on April 28, 2023.
Bell was selected by the company’s Board of Directors following a thorough and thoughtful process to select a successor.
“I’m honored to have been asked to lead Leidos into and through its second decade as an independent company,” said Bell. “In its first decade, Leidos has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to the missions of our customers. I’m ready to stand with our 45,000 employees to harness technology and push the boundaries of what’s possible, building an even bolder, brighter future together.”
Prior to joining Leidos, Bell was senior vice president of global sales & marketing for defense, space & security at The Boeing Company. He was President of Rolls-Royce Defense Aerospace, having joined as President, Customer Business, North America in mid-2012. He spent more than two decades with Boeing in a variety of leadership positions within the defense, space and security business and began his aerospace career with Lockheed Martin in human space flight.
Bell and Shapard succeed Roger Krone, who served as chairman and CEO since 2014.
Veridos, a global leader in integrated identity solutions, presents a new solution for facilitating seamless travel. VeriGO MobileTravel Assist enables users to transfer personal data from their electronic passport to their smartphone via an app, which afterwards can be used to register for travel, to apply for visas or even to provide personal information to healthcare applications. The recipients of the data benefit from an easy-to-integrate solution to process high-quality data records.
With the VeriGO MobileTravel Assist app for Android and iOS, users can read personal data from the chip of their ePassport via NFC (near field communication), store it on their smartphone and transfer it to websites, apps and readers used by public authorities, tour operators or airports. Special wallet functions enable the management and transfer of multiple passport data sets, such as those of family members, in one go. The solution meets governmental requirements for handling personal information, as the data is completely protected by the app. It stores sensitive information in a dedicated space and establishes secure connections to the target systems for their transfer.
As VeriGO MobileTravel Assist does not require manual transmission of passport data, users save a lot of effort and time. Eliminating the need to switch between different media also minimizes opportunities for error. Recipients receive high-quality, signed and verifiable data for further processing in their systems. Since the records contain passport photos, they can also be used for personal visual checks. The solution’s use cases are diverse: from registering with tour operators and applying for visas, to checking in for flights, dropping off baggage and boarding, or checking in at hotels. But scenarios beyond travel are also possible, such as verification for the purchase of age-restricted or particularly high-value goods, as well as providing personal information to healthcare platforms or even for know-your-customers (KYC) processes in banking transactions to protect against fraud or other abuses.
VeriGO MobileTravel Assist fully complies with the requirements of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) for digital travel credentials (DTC). This ensures the international compatibility of the solution with the systems of the data recipients – even if they are of official origin. All that is required to receive the data is the integration of a backend server and a front-end plug-in. The already well-established Veridos’ digital travel authorization solution VeriGO SmartTravel is already equipped with the VeriGO MobileTravel Assist functionality as an optional feature.
“With VeriGO MobileTravel Assist, passports go mobile and take the travel experience to a new level,” explains Xavier Prost, Head of Identity Management Systems at Veridos. “Our solution covers the complete end-to-end process and allows for easy integration into existing online services with minimal effort. That way, it can bring many benefits to identity protection in the digital space, such as preventing from identity fraud, improving accuracy, allow for faster service time and streamline processes. Our solution also ensures secure and GDPR-compliant handling of sensitive passport data at every step, while preserving privacy.”
The mayor of New York City announced that the New York Police Department would start using Boston Dymanics’ robotic dogs in certain situations, specifically life threatening situations.
The types of events the robotic dogs will be used in include hostage negotiations, counterterrorism incidents and other situation as warranted, according to Jeffrey Maddrey, chief of department.
New York City attempted to begin the program two years earlier but the public outrage forced the police department to reconsider which it has now done.
Finland became NATO’s newest member on April 4, 2023, upon depositing its instrument of accession to the North Atlantic Treaty with the United States at NATO Headquarters in Brussels. NATO Allies signed Finland’s Accession Protocol on July 5, 2022, after which all 30 national parliaments voted to ratify the country’s membership.
“We welcome Finland to the Alliance!,” said NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, as Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto deposited Finland’s instrument of accession with the government of the United States, represented by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. The Secretary General then welcomed Finnish President Sauli Niinistö to NATO Headquarters for a flag-raising ceremony to mark the country’s accession to the Alliance.
Speaking ahead of the ceremony, the Secretary General thanked President Niinistö for his outstanding leadership and for leading Finland into the most successful Alliance in history. “I am deeply proud to welcome Finland as a full-fledged member of our Alliance and I look forward to also welcoming Sweden as soon as possible,” he said. “Joining NATO is good for Finland, it is good for Nordic security and it is good for NATO as a whole,” he added. The Secretary General also noted that Finland’s accession shows the world that President Putin failed to “slam NATO’s door shut.” “Instead of less NATO, he has achieved the opposite; more NATO and our door remains firmly open,” he said.
The Finnish national anthem and the NATO hymn were played, as Finland’s flag was raised outside NATO Headquarters for the first time, in the presence of President Niinistö, Foreign Minister Haavisto, Defence Minister Kaikkonen, the foreign ministers of all NATO Allies and invitee Sweden. Simultaneous flag-raising ceremonies took place at Allied Command Operations (SHAPE) in Mons (Belgium) and Allied Command Transformation in Norfolk, Virginia (United States). Standing alongside President Niinistö, the Secretary General said: “Finland is safer and NATO is stronger with Finland as an Ally. Your forces are substantial and highly capable, your resilience is second to none and for many years troops from Finland and NATO countries have worked side-by-side as partners. From today, we stand together as Allies.”
Motorola Solutions (NYSE: MSI) today announced the new Avigilon physical security suite that provides secure, scalable and flexible video security and access control to organizations of all sizes around the world. The Avigilon security suite includes the cloud-native Avigilon Alta and on-premise Avigilon Unity solutions, each powered by advanced analytics and designed to provide an effortless user experience.
Avigilon has been the capstone of Motorola Solutions’ Video Security & Access Control business, which has grown through strategic acquisitions over the past five years to achieve over $1.5 billion in annual sales (2022). The launch of the new Avigilon security suite marks the combination of technologies from three acquisitions – Avigilon (2018), Openpath (2021) and Ava Security (2022) – to create one of the most extensive physical security platforms on the market today, all under a modernized Avigilon brand.
“Individually, Avigilon, Ava Security and Openpath offer excellence in their fields; together, they’re exponentially more powerful,” said John Kedzierski, senior vice president, Video Security & Access Control, Motorola Solutions. “The new Avigilon security suite makes enterprise-grade physical security accessible to businesses of any size, with modular layers of security that can be tailored to protect them from the increasing number and complex nature of threats around the world. It fills a critical void in the market today, bringing together the necessary capabilities to help keep people, property and assets safe.”
Motorola Solutions’ video cameras allow customers to comply with the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) Sec. 889 and highlights Motorola Solutions’ continued commitment to advancing technologies that protect the nation’s networks and supply chains from equipment that threatens national security.
Avigilon Alta is an entirely cloud-nativesecurity suite that brings together Ava Security’s video portfolio and Openpath’s access control solutions. It requires no infrastructure beyond cameras, controllers and access control readers utilizing cloud infrastructure managed by Motorola Solutions. Avigilon Unity is an on-premise security suite that has all the hallmarks of the original Avigilon portfolio, including Avigilon Control Center, Avigilon Cloud Services and Access Control Manager. It is designed for enterprises that want to manage their own systems.
Both Avigilon Alta and Avigilon Unity feature:
Scalable, flexible design for today and the future. The Avigilon security suite can scale as businesses grow, enabling organizations to include multiple sites, cameras and locations that can be operated from anywhere via a browser or mobile device.
End-to-end security technology for complete situational awareness. The Avigilon security suite centralizes video security, access control, analytics and decision management into one easy-to-use platform.
Advanced artificial intelligence (AI) for proactive security alerts in real-time. The Avigilon security suite helps to make watching live video obsolete with AI-enabled analytics. Automatic alerts are sent to security operators who can securely access the platform from anywhere on any device to gain immediate visibility and insight into a threat.
The Biden-Harris Administration has opened applications for a new multi-billion-dollar program to fund electric vehicle (EV) charging and alternative-fueling infrastructure in communities across the country and along designated highways, interstates and major roadways. This is a step towards the U.S. President’s goals of building a national network of 500,000 public EV charging stations and reducing national greenhouse gas emissions by 50–52% by 2030.
The U.S. Department of Transportation’s new Charging and Fueling Infrastructure (CFI) Discretionary Grant Program, established by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will provide $2.5 billion over five years to a wide range of applicants, including cities, counties, local governments, and Tribes. This round of funding makes up to $700 million from fiscal years 2022 and 2023 funding available to strategically deploy EV charging and other alternative vehicle-fueling infrastructure projects in publicly accessible locations in urban and rural communities, as well as along designated Alternative Fuel Corridors (AFCs).
“By helping bring EV charging to communities across the country, this Administration is modernizing our infrastructure and creating good jobs in the process,” said U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. “With today’s announcement, we are taking another big step forward in creating an EV future that is convenient, affordable, reliable, and accessible to all Americans.”
The CFI Discretionary Grant Program builds on the $5 billion National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program, for which FHWA published finalized minimum standards earlier this month. EV chargers constructed with CFI funds must adhere to those same standards, a requirement that supports a consistent charging experience for users and ensures that our national charging network is convenient, reliable and made in America.
“Extending EV charging infrastructure into traditionally underserved areas will ensure that equitable and widespread EV adoption takes hold,” said U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm. “Ensuring that charging stations are more visible and accessible in our communities addresses the concerns many American drivers have when considering making the switch to electric.”
Latvia, which was formerly a part of the Soviet Union, has been sending cars that have been seized from drunk drivers to help the military effort in Ukraine. The country is working with the NGO Twitter Covvoy. Officials in Latvia said the drink-and-drive seized vehicles will be in better hands there and used for logistics.
The vehicles sent from Latvia are said to be offered for use for war supplies and medical transport. Announcing the transfer of the vehicles to Ukraine, the head of the charity, Renys Poznakas, said the vehicles would be in good hands in Ukraine. The first batch of vehicles from Latvia was sent to Ukraine on Friday. They will be given to a hospital of a Ukrainian army unit in Vinnytsia and a medical association in Kupyansk.
Around the globe, transportation tunnels play a vital role in keeping rail and vehicular traffic moving efficiently and safely. This is why threats to tunnels are of vast concern to the world economy, and why finding effective ways to mitigate these threats are a top priority for security experts. Simon Brimble and Ian Chaney are two such experts.
Simon Brimble is Arup’s associate director of resilience, security and risk. Arup (www.arup.com) is a consulting firm serving clients who operate tunnels, and designers/contractors who are bidding to build a tunnel. In each case, the company identifies potential threats to tunnel security using a threat and risk assessment process. With this data in hand, Arup then develops a security strategy, including physical, electronic and operational requirements to mitigate the identified threats, which are implemented through the design process.
Ian Chaney
Ian Chaney is WSP’s national business line director of geotechnical and tunneling. WSP (www.wsp.com) provides design and engineering services to clients globally for all forms of infrastructure, including tunnels. The company develops des–igns for roadway and transportation tunnel systems that enhance users’ safety and provide protection against potential terrorism, fire and other in-tunnel incidents. WSP also provides integrated electrical and SCADA designs to allow operators flexibility and visibility into their tunnel operations.
TSI brought both of these experts together for a virtual roundtable on this topic. Here is what they told us:
TSI: What are the major threats confronting tunnel security, and how serious are they?
Chaney: Terrorism, fire and flooding, along with cybersecurity breaches of tunnel traffic and control systems, are the major threats facing tunnel security today.
The primary threat that the industry is worried about is that of an explosive, whether it is someone taking an explosive onto a subway train or into a tunnel through a car.
Fires in tunnels are common, including car fires. In all cases, the main concern is getting passengers safely out of the tunnel. This is why all modern tunnels typically have dedicated egress pathways. If there is a major event within a tunnel, the passengers can exit their cars, get into an emergency pathway that is pressurized so it won’t have smoke or heat that escapes into it, allowing people to escape.
Flooding is typically from tidal events. If you have tunnels in coastal areas and tidal surge pushes water over the design flood elevation, that water just escapes into the tunnel. There was a major tunnel flood during Hurricane Sandy in New York, there was also one in Virginia in the early-2000s, both caused by tidal surge.
Those are the primary physical threats. Obviously, the cyber security threat is always there as well, where hackers can essentially hijack the traffic control systems within the tunnel.
TSI: Are theft and public safety also tunnel security issues?
Simon Brimble
Brimble: Yes. Bear in mind that tunnel types can range from a short 200m road tunnel through to a significant underground river crossing — and they can be used by pedestrians, vehicles or trains. They can also be used to provide utility/infrastructure links between two points, which are largely empty for most of the time.
When it comes to security issues, a tunnel serving utilities where powerlines are delivered underground is most likely to suffer from criminal attacks — either theft of the copper wiring which delivers power or from a malicious organization looking to disrupt power supply to a community.
For a railway tunnel, with the potential for children playing near live rail or its use as a potential evacuation route from a train, security must focus on safety. A transport tunnel is harder to regulate due to the variety of vehicles that may use it; a tunnel transporting passenger vehicles will have a very different demographic from an underground tunnel which the public use to cross a road, and the related risks will be similarly varied. Potential security risks can range from damage from terrorist attacks through to environmental protestors blocking access or thoroughfare.
TSI: So how can tunnel designers and operators mitigate these threats, both through new tunnel design and the rehabilitation of existing tunnels??
Brimble: It all starts with planning before anything happens. To really mitigate risk, the development of security plans against real operations is key.
At Arup, we look at the control room operations as well as the teams that run them. We consider the design of the room and the different tasks required to be undertaken by the operators to maintain safety and security during ongoing and security event. We also provide technical plans that can ensure the room and staff are not overloaded under different operating scenarios. We achieve this by bringing together a multi-disciplinary team which can bring different perspectives — from ergonomics and human factors to spatial design — into one cohesive response.
With transport and rail tunnels it is very difficult to predict the potential attack mechanisms so a security plan would comprise of careful thinking around the risk of these threats occurring and mapping the potential operational disruption. At times, these types of identified threats are simply not mitigatable and instead, the risk would be entered into the risk register for the operational team to manage as part of their day-to-day security process.
TSI: Now let’s look at the tunnel threats you have outlined, in terms of what can be done to deal with them. When it comes to terrorist bombs, for instance, can tunnels be hardened to survive such blasts?
Chaney: Yes. Tunnels nowadays can be designed to withstand a blast.
We look at tunnels that transport vehicles, that can be threatened by a car or truck filled with explosives, and we design their connections and segments accordingly. For subway tunnels, we look at a backpack bomb being brought in and what it could do to a tunnel, and we design against it.
TSI: What about fire?
Chaney: The most common way to protect tunnels against fire is by using modern forced ventilation, various fire-proofing products and sprinkler systems. If it is a tunnel that has enough space inside it, we construct these structures inside and then mask them with an interior liner on the tunnel.
Beyond that, the tunnel structure is typically protected with sprinkler systems and fire protection board that goes over the concrete. We don’t want the concrete to get to a temperature that will cause spalling or structural issues. So, we install fire protection board to help with that.
TSI: And flooding?
Chaney: When it comes to flooding, the best way to protect against it is to prevent it from happening in the first place. To do this, we raise the portals and provide walls around the tunnel’s other openings to keep water out even in extreme circumstances. So, if the flood elevation for a hundred-year storm is the existing ground elevation plus 10 feet, we make sure that the grading and the walls around the tunnel are built to, say, elevation plus 13 feet. In this way, no storm or surge that we’ve ever seen before can flood a tunnel.
Beyond that, what we can also do is to provide floodgates at the tunnel entrances and exits. So, if those elevations that I mentioned end up being overwhelmed, the tunnel operator can close the gates prior to a flood occurring. Everything outside the tunnel may be flooded, but the tunnel itself will still stay dry until the floodwaters recede.
TSI: What about deterring theft?
Brimble: To mitigate criminal activity, we would look at how to protect access points into the tunnels. This entails developing a strategy that hardens publicly accessible points, in conjunction with a known response time from capable guardians such as the police or security team, that can work to stop the act taking place.
Using a “deter, detect, delay and detain” approach is key. For example, a physical perimeter barrier such as a fence will deter some people. Electronic detection systems can show when a criminal act is happening or about to happen. And hardened access points can delay the success of the act by the perpetrators until a response can be mobilized by either the police or other organization.
Such an “onion skin” approach, where the protected item (e.g., power cables) has many layers of mitigation around it, is the basis of the tunnel’s security resilience. All these mechanisms must be matched to the day-to-day operations of a tunnel so that processes required to uphold the security are not dropped or reduced once in operation.
TSI: And then there’s cyber threats, including the risk of hackers taking over a tunnel’s IT systems and creating traffic chaos or worse. How do you deal with this?
Brimble: Both existing and new tunnel control facilities need to be assessed against current cyber threat and new systems need to be mitigated for against new threats.
Thankfully, more and more organizations are considering getting ahead of a threat rather than simply mitigating. Information or data gleaned from channels such as social media and other online sources can be used to establish any upcoming threats, which can then be specifically planned around or blocked by a security team.
Although cybersecurity is a key area in boosting resilience, doing so in older systems is a challenge. The onus on operators and maintainers to ensure systems are kept up to date is a continuous challenge, particularly where system OEMs did not consider cyber security at earlier stages of design.
TSI: What threats have yet to be fully addressed in tunnel security, and what is being done to address them?
Brimble: Drone attacks are an underestimated area, largely because it is difficult to predict and mitigate against.
With innovation and developments in related areas, tunnels with new functions and user demographics will bring new challenges in security — for example, freight tunnels are likely to be used by unmanned and remotely driven vehicles soon, which will highlight new and very different risks.
TSI: All told, is it realistically possible to fully protect tunnels from attacks, or is it a case of doing the best that can be done?
Chaney: As tunnels typically allow for public use, they cannot be completely protected against attacks. However, mitigation measures can be imparted such that security threats will not render a tunnel facility useless after an attack, but rather allow it to return to full service after a short amount of time and allow it to retain some amount of limited service during and after a security event.
Brimble: I don’t believe it is possible to fully protect a tunnel from attacks. This is why at Arup we adopt a risk-based approach that allows us to identify all of them and then implement a management plan which covers all bases as much as possible. Some risks are simply not mitigatable; for example, protest groups are dynamic and unpredictable, while terrorist threat defence requires the intelligence community to constantly share data that is up to date and timely. These are very complex environments.
As well, even the best of security plans are not infallible. If a strategy relies on electronic or physical systems that are then not reflected in the operational plan or simply not implemented by the daily security team, that is a shortcoming which will directly impact the security of the tunnel.
TSI: All this being said, are tunnels more secure than people commonly imagine them to be?
Chaney: I think tunnels are extremely secure.
For instance, a lot of people are afraid of getting trapped in a tunnel or having a tunnel flood quickly from waters above it. Those are Hollywood-type scenarios. A lot of tunnels have egress passageways that are dedicated to get people out of a tunnel in the emergency, and the probability of having a tunnel flood while someone is in it is almost basically none.
