TBD

Authors

  • Charles Hoes Hoes Engineering

Keywords:

water supply, chemical, MSDS, MCHM

Abstract

As you have likely heard by now, there was recently a leak of MCHM (4-Methylcyclohexanemethanol) into the drinking water supply in the city of Charleston, West Virginia. It turns out that there was actually more than MCHM involved in the leak, but since the company failed to notify the authorities about the additional chemical(s), they weren’t included in the initial tests for water safety.

The leaking tank problem generated a lot of press because it caused such a large problem to the local community, shutting off the city’s water supply for many days. A couple of interesting problems have been highlighted in the news discussions. One of these was the lack of understanding of the hazards associated with the leaked material. Apparently, the best information available to emergency response personnel was obtained from the material safety data sheets (MSDS). Unfortunately, almost all of the important safety information was listed as “unknown.”

Author Biography

Charles Hoes, Hoes Engineering

Charles “Charlie” Hoes began his consulting business in 1984, providing system safety engineering services to defense, aerospace, semiconductor and general industry. During that time he has become a P.E. in Safety in the State of California, a Certified Safety Profession (CSP) with a specialty System Safety Practices and earned a Master of Science degree in Safety from University of Southern California. In 1988 Charlie incorporated his business under the name of “Hoes Engineering, Inc.” He has many years of experience volunteering in support of the International System Safety Society, filling many positions including past President of the Sacramento Chapter, the Virtual Chapter, and the System Safety Society. He is a past technical editor of the System Society’s journal Hazard Prevention (re-named to be the Journal of System Safety), as well as authoring an ongoing feature article of the Journal of System Safety called “TBD” where he discusses current concerns with the system safety profession.

In his new role of being semi-retired, Charlie continues to actively work with the System Safety Society as well as participating in a few “for hire” and volunteer projects that are particularly interesting, or important, for a variety of reasons. He is enjoying the ability of being a bit more selective with regard to projects that he accepts.

TBD

Downloads

Published

2014-06-01

How to Cite

Hoes, C. (2014). TBD. Journal of System Safety, 50(2), 6–7. Retrieved from https://jsystemsafety.com/index.php/jss/article/view/219

Issue

Section

Columns and Perspectives