Once again I am amazed at how wide a communication medium the internet is. For the second time since I started this blog on AOL I have received a comment from an overseas reader. This one posted her comment on Instablogs.com where I post notices about my blogs as part of my marketing strategy. In response to my blog yesterday about the HAZMAT Team Conference (see: "International Hazardous Materials Response Teams Conference") Grace B from the Philippines posted the following response:
- "This war on terror refuses to be a pandemic fear, in spite of ridiculously desperate efforts exerted by the harbingers of a paranoid world. Ease up."
Instablogs.com tried to keep discussions going on site, so I posted the following reply:
- "While I agree that we should not be paralyzed by an unnatural fear of potential terrorist attacks, the people that are responsible for chemical facilities do have to take reasonable precautions to prevent that unlikely eventuality. The risk of being wrong is just too high. Additionally, the procedures used to prevent terrorist attacks will also help to prevent chemical accidents and even random acts of vandalism. Finally, the law in the United States requires that chemical facilities take these precautions. I am just facilitating the discussion of the types of measures that a reasonable management team would take to comply with those laws."
Considering that Grace B lives in a country where there is an active terrorist organization that is involved in nearly open warfare with the central government, I think that her comments are very hopeful for the world.
I think that if terrorists ever get successful to the point that they cause ‘pandemic fear’ then they have won. We on the other side of the war, those of us who are not ‘harbingers of a paranoid world’, would do well to keep that in mind as we discuss our preparations to protect our facilities against a possible terrorist attack.
We must remember that most of our efforts will ultimately be futile. The individual facility that we are protecting will probably never be attacked. Some may be attacked, but the vast majority will never be attacked. Prudence dictates that we prepare, but our humanity calls for us to remember that our staffs, contractors and surrounding community should not be so violently assaulted with our preparations that we move them to the same fear that the terrorists are trying to instill in their attacks.
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