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Flint Municipal water 89

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moon161

moon161

Mechanical
Dec 15, 2007
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So, Flint has been MI lead poisoned and exposed to legionella bacteria because the water supply was switched from Detroit municipal to the Flint River. Since the polluted river is corrosive and iron rich, lead was leached from pipes and solder into the water of thousands of homes, and legionella bateria (legionaire's diseased) apparently thrived on the dissolved iron.

It was done to save money, it stayed that way because people who knew of the crisis sat on the information and obstructed inquiry.



There HAS to be a (ir)responsible engineer in that chain. What are their duties, did they fail to perform? Would whistleblower action have been appropriate?
 
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My point is people, need and should, do more for themselves, and not expect someone else to look out for their best interest.

[highlight #FCE94F]If you assume that everyone is out to get you and everyone is untrustworthy, there will not be enough time in the day to verify everything. Must be hard to live that way. Don't trust the wife, the kid, the dog, the auto repairman, the next driver, the store clerk, the guy in front of me in line, etc.[/highlight]

That said, it might be difficult for a person to have any information about their city water source. So a higher level of trust is expected of the water provider. But also, water providers should be sending out reports on the water quality (the corporation that provided the water where I grew up did).

[highlight #FCE94F]The capitalists that operate the water companies could not be relied upon to provide reports as part of their normal business as it costs money to make reports. The federal government stepped in and made it a requirement.[/highlight]

It is also my position that we don't hold our public officials accountable enough.

[highlight #FCE94F]If you don't trust them, vote against them the next time or run for office. That is the remedy.[/highlight]

Just a thought, but home lead tests are available, usually in the hardware store next to the radon tests. And maybe more people should be more interested in the water quality in their tap.


[highlight #FCE94F]Another assumption on your part that everyone has the capability to read a lead test. The average person on the street doesn't know the difference between a mg/L and an ounce (of beer).[/highlight]

Even if 1% of people were interested enough, this might have been seen sooner.
 
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Hokie66,
It looks better if you click-drag to select the text. The inversion of the colours makes the red stripes clear and the text blue for me. Much more readable.

bimr,
There are hypertext tags you can use for quotes when you want:
Type this:
[ignore]
...quoted text...
Click to expand...
[/ignore]

There's also a button above the reply box that formats the quote for you.

STF
 
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As a matter of fact, I don't believe everyone has my best interest in mind. And I know I'm right.

But that's off the topic. So anyone up for personal attacks?

"The capitalists that operate the water companies" how many can you name? Most water companies are government or nonprofit corporations.




 
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Bimr,

Very few people have your interest at heart when you break it down. Medicine you take is often ineffective at best, profit driven, fraudulently studied, and too often flat out dangerous. Water contamination problem not just in Flint. Your food is doctored with hormones, pesticides, herbicides, and antibiotics. I am burdened with a military that is no longer about protecting me but to support corporate interest. My environment is polluted to what the law will allow. The bar for which keeps getting lowered. I have a very hard time thinking of when my interest was at heart. Most of the time when it is, it is merely coincidental or a byproduct. It is my job to look out for myself as much as possible. No one else will.
 
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"The capitalists that operate the water companies" how many can you name?

There are many private water companies working for profit:

Veolia Environnement (Vivendi), serving 125.4 million in 2011;
Suez, serving 124.3 million people in 2011 with its US subsidiary United Water and its Spanish subsidiary Aguas de Barcelona;
American Water is a public utility company operating in the United States and Canada provides services to approximately 15 million people in more than[quantify] 45 U.S. states and Ontario, Canada
Closer to Flint, there was the Detroit Water Department. The municipal system was created in the 1800’s because private suppliers were failing to deliver safe drinking water.



HamburgerHelper, Of course there are a few out there like the Martin Shkreli's, the Heather Bresch's, and the Gordon Gecko's. However, those people are the anomalies.
 
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It seems that Glasgow did everything right, but, "Glasgow was also charged criminally and accepted a plea agreement in which he agreed to assist special prosecutors in other cases"

He alerted numerous people to the potential problems.

Dik
 
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dik,

If you read some of the thread above, you will see that Glasgow was not qualified and likely misstated his qualifications to obtain an operators license. In order to obtain a water operator license in most States, it is generally required to work under the supervision of a licensed operator prior to obtaining a license, similar to an apprentice program. On the operator licensing application, you must list where you worked and obtained the treatment plant operating experience. You can't obtain a water operator license without experience and yet the State of Michigan did license Glasgow. It is a mystery how Glasgow obtained a license.

MDEQ requirement for an F-1 water plant operator license "F-1 - 60 Points plus: work in 4 or more categories for at least 1 year AND at least 3 years of operating experience of which year is in a F-2 system or higher." Michigan requires at least 3 years experience.


Knowing the requirements to obtain a license and the fact that Glasgow's career consisted of only working for the City of Flint (which did not have an operational water treatment plant) to obtain the experience, would suggest that he committed fraud in filling out the water treatment license application.

Glasgow resume shows that he never worked at any other operating water treatment plant. Once in charge of the Flint water plant, he obviously did not operate the water treatment plant correctly as shown in the operating results.

Basically, there was an inadequate level of staffing due to a lack of municipal funds and the people in charge of the City did not recognize this and allowed it to happen.


The State also requires that there are be more than one licensed person on staff and there were no others with the proper licenses employed at Flint.
 
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Low pay, no one wants to live in flint, rampant nepotism, politicians pushing an agenda. What could go wrong? I would bet a bag of donuts that there are a bunch of other people working for the city that are not properly qualified.
 
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bimr... quite possible, but when he thought he had a problem, qualified or not, he ran up a red flag... to no avail...

Dik
 
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It wasn't politicians alone. Flint, like many older rust-belt cities, was basically a 'company (or one product) town'. And in this case, the "one" product was automobiles, produced by General Motors in particular. A lot of the s the citizens of Flint was directly related to the ebb and flow of the auto industry. And it took close to 100 years for this to become institutionalized to the point where neither the citizen nor their representatives, locally or otherwise, could really do anything about it. It was totally beyond their control.

John R. Baker, P.E. (ret)
EX-Product 'Evangelist'
Irvine, CA
Siemens PLM:
UG/NX Museum:

The secret of life is not finding someone to live with
It's finding someone you can't live without
 
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dik,

More than possible. Similar to the responsibility of being a PE, the operator in responsible charge is designated by the owner of the system or facility and is responsible for the operation of the facility. If he had known what he was doing, he would have refused to certify the water as safe and instead would have resigned.

 
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