When prosecutors present the results of a piece of evidence analyzed in the lab, a question often comes up: how good is the measurement? It’s an important one to ask, because the error bars tell you how good the measurement is. If a Breathalyzer measurement was collected by police, and the result was near the … More Erroneous Drug Quantity Measurements using Uncalibrated FTIR/ATR Instruments
Dr. Elizabeth Jensen’s presentation to the American Society of Safety Engineers (soon to be Safety Professionals) Energy Corridor meeting is linked below. Practical Cybersecurity: Where You Fit into the Big Picture
The combustion engine relies on its coolant system to function properly. When it doesn’t, the cylinder head can crack due to heat stress, the differential thermal expansion of metal. Naturally, the fracture occurs between the hot area (combustion exhaust) and cold areas of the cylinder. When the metal cracks between these two areas, coolant can … More Cracked Head (Cylinder Head Fracturing)
Being that humans are creatures of habit, an uneven stairwell challenges users, even those grown familiar with asymmetries in construction. The most critical components of a stairwell to avoid becoming a tripping or slipping hazard include a decent (and uniform) tread and riser value. In the case of International Building Code specifications, this is 11 … More Stairwells and the Codes
There are various models that emphasize different components that combined into an accident. While Heinrich’s Axioms of Industrial Safety are most widely applied, there are others that target relationships among the contributing factors to an injury. As a brief introduction, I’d like to share a few of our investigations and a model that aligns with … More Incidents & Accident Models
As documented in “ATLANTA BRIDGE COLLAPSE: What burned under the I-85 overpass?” by Richard Elliot and Rikki Klaus of wsbtv, the material stored under the I-85 bridge for 10 years was High Density Polyethylene. As I discuss what that means fire-safety-wise, I’ll be generally talking about polyethylene. Polyethylene is constructed from the combination of ethylene … More Understanding The I-85 Fire
As you may be aware, US congress has enabled ISPs to perform the following actions legally: Sell your company’s browsing history to competitors or opposition Sell the contents of your company’s emails to competitors or opposition Install cookies on your devices that cannot be deleted without deeper intervention making the data collection above easier and … More Protect your business from ISP eliminations of privacy
As many of us know, technology can come as a double-edged sword. The use and incorporation of a particular technology cannot reduce effectiveness particularly in life-threatening situations. Smart technology, the use of computer-based algorithms to solve problems, is no less sensitive to judicious application. Questions that must be addressed include: How reliable are the sensors … More Technology in the Fire Service
The article below describes OSH research approaches to deal with the fact that if a safety program is working effectively, then nothing happens. How do you measure savings from non-events to justify the costs of an OSH program? The experts at ACS Engineering & Safety have years of experience investigating failures, fires, and accidents. Almost … More Researching Safety From Experience
Our education management software package (discussed in this post) can be easily cut down to provide a straightforward AND SECURE recordkeeping service. Features include: enabling specific individuals access to submit materials for safety officer approval automatic formatting for uploading to OSHA (when required) reminders and required content prompting Unlike most software companies, the software itself … More OSHA Injury and Illness Recordkeeping and Reporting Requirements
