A weeklong schedule of activities that was set to kick off today has been canceled.
BSidesAugusta organizer, and COO of Security Onion Solutions, LLC, Phil Plantamura shared the update with ABD on Sunday.
“Completely canceled. We’ve canceled all events for BSidesAugusta, the Security Onion Conference, and the training. We had a speaker dinner. It’s been canceled, volunteer orientation, and all that has been canceled. We’ve issued refunds to all ticket purchasers, including for the training,” he said.
Destination Augusta had estimated the full week of activities, originally set for Sept. 30 through Oct. 5, would attract more than 1,000 attendees with an economic impact of more than $500,000.
Plantamura said the members of the board met on Sunday and the decision to cancel was unanimous.
“We felt that although the infrastructure here at the Georgia Cyber Center is good and up and running, and they were ready for us, the community infrastructure is just not there,” he said. “And it wouldn’t be fair to have people come in from out of town and participate in this and add more strain to the infrastructure.”
BSidesAugusta was partnering with HACK Augusta and theClubhou.se for some events in the Georgia Cyber Innovation and Training Center.
“The two events that were local, hosted here by HACK Augusta, those have been postponed indefinitely,” explained Plantamura. “They’ll update their websites for when those are going to be rescheduled.”
Augusta is one of more than 100 cities worldwide that hosts a BSides conference. Plantamura said the Augusta conference is the largest in the southeast with a number of the speakers and attendees coming from out of town. They decided to cancel before they began traveling to Augusta.
“I’ve already spoken to multiyear attendees. I spoke to one this morning, ‘You made the right decision. That’s what I would have done’ he told me,” Plantamura shared.
He added BsidesAugusta 2024 is unlikely to be rescheduled, but they’re holding out hope.
“We believe BSidesAugusta is not going to come back until 2025, but we’re still in discussions about when we might reschedule for if there’s an option,” but he added many people involved are dealing with personal situations with damaged homes and property resulting from the storm.
He said anyone with questions or needing additional information can visit the website: https://bsidesaugusta.org/
For information about the events co-sponsored with HACK Augusta and theClubhou.se, visit: http://hackaugusta.org/ or https://www.theclubhou.se/
ABD has been in contact with Destination Augusta about the overall impact of cancellations. By far, the greatest impact is the cancellation of the Ironman 70.3 competition. More than 6,500 visitors were expected to generate an economic impact of nearly $6 million.
Athletes from across the country would have tackled a quick 1.2-mile down-river swim in the Savannah River before biking 56 miles through rural Augusta, and wind up with the flat 13.1-mile run course along the North Augusta Greeneway trail. The damage from Hurricane Helene, including hundreds of downed trees, power outages across the CSRA, and flooding on the Savannah River would have made that 70.3-mile trek impossible.
A Destination Augusta spokesman said they were meeting Sunday to assess the storm’s full impact and anticipate having a report later this week.
Additionally, all Augusta Metro Chamber events have been canceled for the week through October 4.
The Chamber is gathering resources to support members and will be sending those out soon. Businesses with specific needs are asked to reach out to the Chamber directly at 706-821-1300.
The Georgia Chamber of Commerce has announced the cancellation of the 2024 Rural Prosperity Summit in Tifton.
The two-day event was scheduled to take place on October 2 and 3 at the UGA Tifton Campus Conference Center. That space will now serve as temporary housing for Georgia Power linemen working to restore power to communities across South Georgia.
In place of the in-person event, the Georgia Chamber will hold a virtual briefing from elected officials and business leaders, to provide more information on statewide recovery efforts. The virtual briefing will be held on Wednesday, October 2.
Registrations for the 2024 Rural Prosperity can be refunded or donated on behalf of the registrant to support the Red Cross’ Hurricane Helene relief efforts in Georgia. Selections must be made using the Google Form available here. If no response is received by October 31, registrations will automatically be donated to the Red Cross.
