In light of the events in September, it is time for everyone to realize we need to be far more cautious in our work environment. We have the technology to provide safe buildings and safe travel. What we have lacked has been the commitment to use these tools to their full potential. Call it lazy or complacent. Call it anything you like, we need to change and adjust to the world around us beginning with "allowing these tools to be used."
These problems, with entrance into a building or onto an airplane, affect the consulting engineer, project manager, and/or engineering technician more often than the building engineer. We "tend to travel" more as our businesses have grown from local to regional to national to international. At the same time, the facility manager has "bigger problems" because he or she is counting on a lot of support service staff to do their job without exception.