A question of when, not if...

Work is now being done on the Mill River park again, ignoring the political and economic issues associated with this work, i find my self wondering what kind of engineers are they using?
Earlier in the year we had some significant rain, it was not all that unusual, large amounts of rain and flooding occur often in the spring and fall and sometimes in the summer.
This a picture of the flood...

This is a picture of the planting they are doing.

All will be under water and those were very strong flows!

It just will not hold for one of those floods.

Risk Factors

Well over 30 years ago, i worked at an adhesives and plastics corporation.
It was not my first venture into the chemical industry, but it was eye-opening.
The company received a request from a very well known food company that there was a taste and odor problem in some of their product and could we help determine the cause.
There were consumer complaints.
This company's role was that they manufactured plastic adhesives to meld food packaging with product advertising packaging and this was used with the packaging for the product.


What we found was that the solvent used in the adhesive were still present in the finished product and that included some nasty, carcinogenic and toxic solvents.
The fix was that the heat sealer had broken and had been so for some months and was replaced at the packing plant.
The tainted product had been in the consumer market for over 4 months.
No recall was issued, no government agency was informed and life went on for the company (both of them) as if nothing had ever happened.
I was young and kept no documentation and so this is considered "hearsay".
but if one company can do that, how many others do it?
We wonder why there is such an increase in cancer and other problems?

The US EPA, my tirade

I think most people reading this blog realize I have a bit of a disdain for the US EPA.
Recently, in the news, the issue of PCB's in caulk at New York Public schools were brought to a climax with an agreement to "study" the real health issue.
They set a standard in 1977 (?) and now are kind of backing down because of the huge cost for remediation.
This is mostly the case for Us EPA policy.
Another example is that there were many pesticides banned for commercial use in 1977, particularly in agriculture, but pest control companies were allowed to use them for residential homes termite remediation!  Where it may well be part of the issue in some of the wells in the North Stamford area.

Money and health do not mix, except at the US EPA.