The Mheda Journal

As was prominently featured on the news this week, much of the United States was hit by a winter storm on Tuesday and Wednesday. Here in Syracuse, NY, we were spared (for once!) with only a few inches. Other parts of the world, most notably Dallas (where preparations for that big football game this weekend were interrupted) and Chicago (whenever The Weather Channel’s live remote is set up in your town, something bad is about to happen), were hit much worse. The combination of ice, sleet and snow throughout much of the Eastern part of the country made travel and commuting difficult, if not impossible.

Here in Syracuse, where we annually receive an average of about 120 inches of snow, dozens of snowplows, salt trucks and emergency crews are always on standby and ready to jump into action. In places like Texas, where such storms are rare, it made for a disaster. No matter how much advance notice there is, if you don’t have the materials to clear the snow then there’s not much you can do. All of this is common sense, but what really struck me is how natural events like this can have such a major impact on business for companies located in the heart of the storm.

I know of multiple companies, in this and other industries, that were closed yesterday because workers couldn’t make it to the office. In some places, the unplanned closure extended into today as cleanup is still underway. Some businesses with delivery vehicles couldn’t make their usual rounds. Those lost hours and routes don’t even count any storm-related damage resulting from power outages, icy roads, collapsed buildings and the like. Particularly for small companies, these events can prove catastrophic.

So anytime something like this happens, be it a hurricane, mudslide, wildfire, snow storm, flood, or what have you, the impact on the affected businesses can be huge. I’d be curious to know how some MHEDA Members who were in the path of the worst of the storm were impacted. Did you close? Were you open but not busy? Working from home? Did you have a disaster plan in place beforehand or just take it as it comes? I’d love to hear some stories from the members out there.

Rescue capsule (Hugo Infante/Associated Press)

The operation to rescue 33 miners trapped about 2,000 feet below the Earth’s surface in a Chilean copper and gold mine for 68 days is underway. Last night, the first miner made the journey up the rescue chute in the transport capsule and was greeted with rousing cheers from the assembled crowd. It was quite a heart-warming scene. Officials say they will continue to bring up one worker per hour for the next day or so to get all 33 men up safely. Here’s a good article to get answers to some rescue FAQ’s.

It was a great moment that would not have been possible without the material handling industry. The rescue operation is utilizing a crawler crane to insert giant metal tubes that reinforce the rescue shaft to make sure the capsule can move freely. For those who don’t know (I had to look it up on wikiMHEDA), a crawler crane is one that is mounted on a set of tracks and can remain stable with no outriggers, typically with a lift capacity ranging from 40 to 3,500 U.S. tons.

Of course, one could argue that moving the miners from the underground to the surface is the very definition of material handling—moving objects from here to there. And it’s true. This industry covers a broad spectrum of activity. At times like this, it feels good to play even a small part in an industry that, even though the general public doesn’t know much about it, plays such a large role in our world at large. That, too, is a very heart-warming thought.

Before it gets too far in the rearview mirror, I wanted to take a moment to remember the tragedies that occured in New York City, Washington, DC, and a field in Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001. As we passed the ninth anniversary of those events last weekend, it reminded me that our industry, the material handling industry, played a significant role in the aftermath and cleanup of the World Trade Center. The First Quarter 2002 issue of The MHEDA Journal (unfortunately, this article isn’t available online) outlined a few of the many inspirational acts that MHEDA members made in the days and weeks following the attacks.

• MHEDA staff worked diligently to coordinate hundreds of calls to the office by members who wanted to help. They found an organization who accepted donations directly to help the relief efforts, and donated pallet jacks and more poured in via the Feed the Children charity.
• A conveyor was set up at the Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island to help sort through debris being remvoed from Ground Zero. This is, of course, in addition to all the equipment and supplies being used at the scene.
• 2007 MHEDA President John Cosgrove, was a volunteer firefighter in his hometown of Fair Lawn, NJ, about 15 miles from Manhattan. The morning of the attacks, his unit was designated as a “task force” and he reported to his fire house. His house was never called, but it was an experience he won’t soon forget.

These are only a few of the ways that our industry rallied in the days that followed. Thank you to everyone who helped and our prayers remain with those who perished. God Bless America.

A

In my June 4 post about accountability in business, I mentioned, almost as a throwaway comment, that the BP oil spill is a reminder of the importance of developing and implementing a disaster plan in your business. In the days since, the storms and floods that have hit the Southern United States have brought the issue of disaster planning even more to the forefront.

You never know when Mother Nature will wreak havoc, be it in the form of a tornado, hurricane, wildfire, volcano eruption, earthquake, flood or who knows what else. Yes, I’m sure you have insurance to take care of short-term closures and pay for facility damage. But who’s going to take care of your customers if you’re forced to shut down for an extended period? Can your business withstand such a closure? Do your employees know how to react?

In the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in 2005, The MHEDA Journal offered a few tips for businesses to set up a plan for dealing with such natural disasters. We also published helpful suggestions for repsonding to a pandemic. You never know when you’re going to need it.

Do you have a plan in place? What is it? Leave a comment here to let me know!

Accountability is one of my favorite traits. There’s not much I respect more than someone who makes a mistake and says, “Whoops, I messed that up. Sorry. I will do my best to make sure that doesn’t happen again.” When you think about it, that’s all you can ask. If what’s done is done, a little “I’m sorry” goes a long way. Of course, part of accountability is also following through on making sure that it doesn’t happen again.

In one of the most bizarre, most talked-about moments in recent baseball history, Detroit Tigers pitcher Armando Galarraga was deprived of a perfect game on June 2 when first-base umpire Jim Joyce incorrectly ruled that a Cleveland Indians batter beat out an infield hit when, in fact, he should have been called out. (For those among you who aren’t baseball fans, a perfect game means that nobody on the opposing team reaches base. No hits, no walks, no errors, no hit batsmen. 27 batters go up, 27 make outs. It’s one of the rarest feats in the game.) Galarraga eventually retired the next batter to complete the shutout and earn a victory, but was denied only the 21st perfect game in major league history and a chance at so-called immortality by a call that replays confirmed was blatantly incorrect.

After the game, Joyce owned up to his mistake, admitting that he blew the call and apologizing personally to Galarraga. I give him credit for doing so, for holding himself to a standard of accountability, and most of America has been willing to do so as well.

How does all this relate to business, you ask? Well, accountability goes a long way in business too. Just look at BP and the current situation in the Gulf. While their CEO and PR team are busy downplaying the amount of oil spilling into the gulf (only 1,000 barrels of oil daily? Really, BP?), denying their level of blame for the initial explosion, and pointing fingers for reasons why each attempt to close the pipe is failing, the public trust in anything that happens from here forward is plummeting along with BP’s stock price. Some level of public discontent was inevitable given the severity of the situation, but BP could have mitigated the outcry somewhat by some old-fashioned honesty and accountability.

We made it a company exercise a few months back to read “Journey to the Emerald City,” a book  by Roger Connors and Tom Smith about how to create a culture of accountability in your business. It’s a good, quick read and it provides a good framework for setting goals and holding people accountable. I recommend it.

Just one more comment: The oil spill tragedy also is a reminder of the importance of having a business disaster plan in place. Be ready for the contingencies!

Thanks for reading and have a good weekend!

A few weeks ago, I posted a blog about the proliferation of major earthquakes and how the damage they cause is related to building codes. A recent Op-Ed piece in The New York Times illustrated a similar point. The piece of the article that jumped out to me most:

“…based on the kind of damage that buildings suffered in Chile, tall structures in the earthquake zones of the United States appear to be at much higher risk than we thought. This lesson should be of obvious concern to San Francisco and Los Angeles. But it is actually the Pacific Northwest that is most vulnerable to a mega-quake like Chile’s.”

A reader of mine commented on the original post that Chile has exacting building codes, some of the most stringent in the world. Some of those buildings still were decimated. Such a quake in the U.S. may or may not be catastrophic depending on where it hits.

It’s an important issue, and one that material handling distributors, particularly those who do storage and handling systems and large rack installations. According to at least  this author, we should expect those codes to change.

The article was in the Times on Sunday, March 28, and was written by Peter Yanev, a structural engineer. It’s an interesting read. I recommend it. 

Is it just me, or has their been an inordinate number of earthquakes lately? A 7.0 in Haiti on January 12, the 8.8 monster in Chile on February 27, the what-would-normally-be-considered large 5.5 in Turkey on March 8, and then another 7.0 rocker in Chile today. The devastation and despair these have caused have been well-documented and I don’t want to go into detail about that here. (Though I would be remiss not to once again mention the American Logistics Aid Network, of which MHEDA is a major contributor. Click the link above to learn more.)

I’m thinking about it more in terms of building codes. A colleague of mine mentioned earlier today how it’s times like these when those annoying building codes that sometimes seem so frivolous don’t seem so bad after all. Hearing the stories of crumbling, cheaply made buildings in some of these places makes you glad, at least for the short-term, that we have codes and requirements in place.

Now, I don’t know what sort of building codes, if any, are in place in Chile, Haiti and Turkey. Maybe the damage would have been the same — granted, an 8.8-magnitude quake would likely do pretty severe damage even to a strong, secure building. But it does make one realize that those codes are there for a reason. Up here in usually-earthquake-free upstate New York , here’s hoping that I don’t need to ever find out.

For more info on building codes in material handling, read this archived article in The MHEDA Journal Online.

The mass destruction in Haiti following last Tuesday’s earthquake there has mobilized people from around the world to provide relief to affected citizens. (Visit www.redcross.org or click here for more information about how you can help.)

The material handling industry is playing a central role, according to an article in Monday’s USA Today. 

“By Sunday, the Air Force had landed some 300 planes, most of them laden with relief supplies. Four large forklifts unloaded the pallets as they landed and the aid was shipped out on trucks and helicopters. Incoming planes were required to file flight plans with landing times to ensure an orderly flow. The Haitian government has signed an agreement granting the U.S. formal control of the airport.”

Originally, only one forklift was being used. “With only one forklift at first, the Air Force couldn’t quickly unload the planes coming in Thursday and Friday, McMullen said. Because of that, and because the airport lacked ground refueling, many planes were turned away,” the article states.

Luckily, some of the original logistical headaches at the airport have been reduced, and aid is beginning to flow more quickly (though not yet at the optimum rate). Throughout the city of Port-au-Prince, there is still much work to be done.

Any help you can give is appreciated. Visit www.alanaid.org to lend a helping hand.

(photo courtesy of haitifeed.com)

To anyone in the material handling industry (and others, too) interested in contributing to the relief effort in Haiti, take note:

In the wake of Tuesday’s tragic earthquake in Haiti, MHEDA is working with the American Logistics Aid Network (ALAN) and major humanitarian relief agencies to identify the most critical relief needs.

 As needs are identified that can be met through the expertise and resources of ALAN’s member base, MHEDA Members will be notified, and the needs will be posted on the ALAN web portal: www.ALANaid.org.  

 “While ALAN’s focus has been primarily domestic, our mission is to engage the supply chain community to support humanitarian relief efforts wherever the need arises,” says Jock Menzies, ALAN president. “Our hearts go out to the people of Haiti, and we’re eager to support their needs through our network of supply chain professionals.”