Monthly Archives: July 2010

The Mets Are Trying to Give You Salmonella

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Mets Citi Field

Like clockwork, the New York Mets fill their fans with heartache every September. Now, it looks like they’re trying to get an early start on some stomach aches, too.

According to ESPN’s list of stadium “vendor inspection reports,” Citi Field is rife with health code violations, at least one of which included a bunch of warm, raw chicken being stored on premises

Citi Field
New York Mets
Vendors with critical violations: 45%
Inspection report excerpt: Inspectors found 20 pounds of grilled chicken registered at 70 degrees in a refrigerator, about 30 degrees warmer than allowed.

Yuck.

But the Mets are far from the worst offenders. The Consumerist has compiled it’s “Top 10 Disgusting Stadium Food Vendor Health Violations.” (I presume they mean the “top” 10.)

Look what’s going on in Miami — in a stadium named after an insurance company no less.

Sun Life Stadium
Miami Dolphins, Florida Marlins
Vendors with critical violations: 93%
Inspection report excerpt: In June 2009, an employee complained anonymously that small insects and other debris were blended into frozen alcoholic beverages at a stand where equipment wasn’t being cleaned. When inspectors checked, they issued a critical violation for a buildup of slime inside the frozen drinks machine.

I guess the lesson here is to stick to the peanuts and Cracker Jacks.

In related news, Claire Wilkinson of the wonderful III blog Terms + Conditions just wrote an interesting post on food safety. Focusing on an op-ed from this Sunday’s New York Times urging Congress to improve standards and grant more authority to the FDA.

While the elderly and people with compromised immune systems face an elevated risk from food borne pathogens like listeria, campylobacter and salmonella, by far the most vulnerable group are children under the age of four.

The economic cost of the problem is also huge. A recent study sponsored by Pew Charitable Trusts puts the total annual health-related cost of food-borne illness in the U.S. at about $152 billion.

Schlosser notes that legislation in the Senate would give the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) the power to order the recall of contaminated foods and punish companies that knowingly sell them. It would also improve the FDA’s ability to trace outbreaks back to their source.

No word, however, on whether or not the FDA can help the Mets crawl back into the Wild Card race.

Learning Through Destruction at FM Global

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FMglobal

FM Global’s Research Campus is one of the more interesting things about the insurance industry. Basically, what the company did was build a giant, airplane-hanger-sized warehouse so it would have a place to blow things up. It’s not all fun and pyromania, however. The real value comes from what FM Global observes.

By testing the destructive potential of certain disaster scenarios, the company is able to better understand how building materials, walls, windows, roofs, houses, warehouses and even entire industrial facilities can be fortified to withstand the worst.

It’s all about loss control, really.

For example, the company might do an experiment to find out how much wind it takes to compromise the structural integrity of the Model ABC Roof Flashing sold by XYZ Company if it is installed with 12 half-inch nails. If the wind exposure (both in MPH and duration) that sends the flashing flying is a realistic figure to expect in a certain location (say, Florida) then you now know that it is not the best building material to use if you’re building a tiki restaurant in South Beach. On the other hand, if the flashing does withstand 160 mph winds for 30 minutes, the company now knows it won’t fail in anything but the most catastrophic storm.

Such knowledge is great for the industry at large — it helps all stakeholders learn how building materials hold up in disasters. And the proprietary results are even better for FM Global — they help the company be extremely confident in its underwriting decisions.

Rudd Bosman explains as much in the video below, which complements a new article on the campus that Fortune published in its latest issue. “We spent well over $100 million in capital expense on this facility. It’s absolutely worth it. It’s where we learn what we need to do to prevent losses from happening. That knowledge is invaluable.”

A few years ago, our Editor in Chief Morgan O’Rourke got the chance to tour FM Global’s Research Campus on a day where some serious explosions were taking place.

Outside, it was a quiet, clear January day in the woods of western Rhode Island. But hidden just off the road, in a relatively nondescript structure, I stood in awe some 100 feet away from the largest fire that I had ever seen. A fuel leak had caused a blaze nearly three stories high with flames so intense that the facility’s emergency sprinkler systems were actually making it worse. When the water came in contact with the burning fuel, it caused a reaction much like what happens when water is splashed on a grease fire in the kitchen. Huge fireballs erupted, threatening to engulf the ceiling and the sensitive machinery located there. Even from my distant vantage point, it was very hot and very impressive. It was also a simulation. Welcome to just another day at the office for the scientists and engineers at the FM Global Research Campus.

Check out the rest of Morgan’s feature for more on the most destructive place in insurance.

You can also find more about the campus on FM Global’s website.

Whistleblowing Pays

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Sure, sure, whistleblowing pays off by relieving one’s conscious. But did you know it now also pays a much higher monetary reward?

With the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform bill now in place, whistleblowers will not only have even more protection from their employer seeking revenge, they will also be rewarded financially at a much greater rate than in the past. According to the recent reform, successful informants will be entitled to collect “10% to 30% of the wrongdoers’ payout” to the securities and exchange commission.

Historically, the SEC could only reward whistleblowers who were involved with insider trading cases. And apparently, they weren’t very generous.

During its 20-year existence, the SEC’s whistle-blower program has paid out only $159,537 to five claimants. No wonder observers of securities fraud have had little incentive to spill the beans. “Basically, [whistleblowing] ruins your life,” says Luigi Zingales, a professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business who has studied the issue of whistle-blowers. “What is worth your life getting ruined? It’s pretty expensive.”

Expensive no more?

That’s what many interpret from the new financial reform bill. Besides generous monetary rewards, the new law also greatly expands whistle-blowers’ rights. Now, if you tell on your employer, you are allotted a whopping six years to bring your case to court, as opposed to a mere 90-day statute (the rule under Sarbanes-Oxley).

The National Whistleblowers Center was nice enough to compile everything pertaining to whistleblower protections from the Dodd-Frank Act. Also, our own Jared “Dubs” Wade blogged about the topic — and included a sweet example of his photoshop skills.

whistleblower

Toyota Settles Hybrid Patent Case

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As we reported a few weeks ago, Toyota has been embroiled in a patent dispute with Paice LLC concerning its hybrid vehicle technology that threatened to halt hybrid imports in the United States.  As it turns out, after six years of litigation, Toyota has finally reached a settlement in the case. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

Paice founder Alex Severinsky, who had claimed that Toyota infringed on his 1994 patent, was pleased with the result.

“Finally people understand the merits of what I invented and give it the proper value,” Severinsky said.

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“Toyota is the leading technology company and finally appreciates the value of the invention.”

Toyota had insisted that, while its technology was similar to Paice patent, its hyrib vehicles were the result of its own independent research. Evidently, both parties were in agreement.

“The parties agree that, although certain Toyota vehicles have been found to be equivalent to a Paice patent, Toyota invented, designed and developed the Prius and Toyota’s hybrid technology independent of any inventions of Dr. Severinsky and Paice as part of Toyota’s long history of innovation,” both companies said in separate statements.

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With this issue out of the way, Toyota can now concentrate on its latest round of subpeonas. This time, a federal grand jury in New York is investigating whether or not Toyota notified the NHTSA in a timely fashion about faulty steering rods.

For Toyota, a bad year just keeps getting worse.

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