Thursday, May 14, 2015

Take on the Amtrak crash

There is nothing more terrifying than realizing that when we do something as innocuous as commuting to work, we are putting our lives in the hands of somebody whose background we know nothing about. Take the Germanwings pilot as an extreme example in a case where there really is nothing an average person could ever do about it. You board a plane or an Amtrak train or a bus and nobody knows what the mindset of the pilot, driver or conductor is. There are other jobs which affect lives but I can't think of many where a fragile mental state could lead to such tragic results. These instances may not happen that often but it still happens too often and they are not all deliberate or preventable but there certainly are ones that are. Look at that ferry captain in Korea for example.
What was particularly troubling was the fact that technology does exist to help prevent instances like this, if this one is deemed preventable, we just don't care to invest in the infrastructure to make it happen let alone have the people who man our transport be thoroughly screened and not overworked to points of physical and mental exhaustion

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