Our very own Lauren Bell has graduated from Leadership St Pete’s (LSP) #BestClassEver. Lauren has served the Innovation District for three and a half years and extended her leadership skills to the Chamber of Commerce’s six-month, volunteer-run program. This year, LSP chose to work with the Infinite Potential Learning Academy, upgrading their basketball court and multi-purpose field to better serve students and the community as a whole. We couldn’t be more proud. Congratulations, Lauren!
To learn more about the LSP class of 2025 and their community project, click here.
Lonestar Data Holdings, based in St. Petersburg, is still going strong after its launch to the Moon in February. Since then, the company has joined a $120 million partnership with Sidus Space and opened a new office in Austin, Texas. Keep following Lonestar’s success as they’ve got big plans in store for 2027.
The innovative ideas are flowing at our Tech X-Changes. Dr. Marcus Beck presented great material on tbeptools, an open-source software program built to visualize data used by TBEP. Visit the tbeptools page for more information.
We rely on hurricane categories to gauge risk, but what if the scale is leaving out the biggest dangers? Jennifer Collins, a hurricane researcher and professor in USF’s School of Geosciences, coauthored a new research paper proposing a more comprehensive approach. The current Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale measures a storm’s strength only by wind, yet wind is responsible for just 8% of hurricane-related fatalities. In contrast, storm surge accounts for 49% and rainfall flooding for 27%.