On January 12 the C-CIES Team officially convened for our first in-person meeting in El Paso, TX at The University of Texas at El Paso. Up to this point we had been working together virtually since we have team members from all over the country from Boston, to Salt Lake City, all the way to Puerto Rico. We were excited to be able to host the team at UTEP and utilize the Interdisciplinary Research Building (IDRB). This is a brand, 150,000-square-foot research facility, which a great auditorium we were able to use for our 2-day meeting.
We also had team members who were unable to travel to El Paso, but the technologies in the IRDB allowed us to connect almost all of our team members during the meeting. Along with finalizing the core elements of our projects, we spent some time exploring El Paso. Out of town team members got a chance to see the Dinosaur Tracks, visit Scenic Drive at sunset, view the East Franklin Mountain Fault (EFMF), and end the day having dinner at an El El Paso staple, Carlos & Mickey's.
The EFMF was especially important because it will be the center piece of one of the upcoming pilot projects. There will be three other pilot projects that will be launched in the coming months. We're so excited to tell you more about them, stay tuned!