“If I had a nickel for every time this happened, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice. Right?” — Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirz Friends and acquaintances recently flooded my inbox with stories about a series of sewer explosions near the north riverfront of St. Louis. It launched several [...]
“The love of a dog is a pure thing. He gives you a trust which is total. You must not betray it.” — Michel Houellebecq A week ago, Vader, a police dog in the Arnold Police Department (APD), died from heat exhaustion after his handler found him in a hot patrol vehicle. Arnold is a [...]
“Catastrophic bridge accidents are rare, but the number and severity of those due to ship collisions far exceed those due to winds, waves, and earthquakes combined.” — Committee on Ship-Bridge Collisions (1983) On Tuesday, March 26, 2024, shortly before 1:30 am, the cargo ship Dali drifted into the Francis Scott Key Bridge, causing the bridge’s [...]
“It’s what you do next that counts.” — Lisa Mackay One of my favorite movies is The Great Waldo Pepper starring Robert Redford as a barnstorming pilot after World War I. One scene is seared into my memory. Waldo Pepper’s friend, Ezra Stiles, crashes during an air show. The crowd surges out to the wrecked [...]
“Automation is driving the decline of banal and repetitive tasks.” — Amber Rudd Five years ago, I had the opportunity to give a TED talk called “Deadly Jobs”. I talked about the hazards that consistently contribute to work-related fatalities and the deadly occupations in the United States. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) recently released [...]
“The only thing we have learnt from experience is that we learn nothing from experience.” — Chinua Achebe Back in December 2021, the BLS report showed that for 2020, the Year of the Pandemic, the total number of work-related fatalities in the U.S. was 4,764. That was significantly less than for the year before. The [...]
“This is the beginning, and the dawn of a new era of transportation.” — Shervin Pishevar On Friday evening, September 29, 2023, at about 8:40 pm, the impatient driver of an SUV decided to pass a truck hauling anhydrous ammonia. Traffic on U.S. 40 was heavier than usual due to a detour of I-70 to [...]
“Earthquakes don’t kill people. Buildings kill people.” — Wendy Bohon, geologist How many times have you been in a hazard review discussing the potential for a particularly severe event when someone asserts, “Well, I’ve never seen anything like that happen.” As though their proclamation of “never” settles the question. I sometimes ask them how long [...]
“Anything can go away. There’s no such thing as security. You can do things that give you the illusion of security, but there’s really no such thing.” — Will Smith Authorization for the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS) expired on July 28, 2023. The House of Representatives passed the reauthorization bill by a vote of [...]
“Once you start something, finish it. Don’t accumulate a backlog of unfinished projects.” — Ed Bliss If you are on the Chemical Safety Board’s distribution list, you may have noticed a lot of trade releases from the CSB in your in-box during the last few weeks. They’ve been busy. A recent press release proudly announced [...]
