OT Snow may dellay delivery

[micky]

Right now there is snow in Texas and Oklahoma and they're saying that this may delay things. Why not send the vaccine somewhere else and catch up with Texas later?

[Dean Hoffman]

Maybe it's already at the vaccination sites. Maybe it's in a van somewhere on the side of a road or at a truck stop. Politics overrules common sense?

[Ed Pawlowski]

The hangup is the hubs for UPS and FedEx. If Memphis or Louisville airports close they are screwed.

[micky]

That's a good answer.

Unless the truck can't move, that's why we have cellphones.

That's what I was thinking.

It would be nice if when they made statements like the one about delay, if they explained why, and if they did, if the news didn't delete that part.

[Snag]

Remember when the post office's motto was "neither rain nor snow nor dark of night etc" ? Fuck that shit , our last mail delivery was 9 days ago on the 8th .

[trader_4]

Why not ask your boy, Uncle Joe? He's in charge.

[rbowman]

At least it's suitably cold...

[gfretwell]

Yeah, where is that military help he promised? They don't have to ship this stuff Fed Ex. These are fairly small boxes. Let Joyce's Air Force deliver them to the cities that are socked in and have the National Guard take them the last mile in a Humvee. After all this NATO bullshit, don't tell me they haven't trained to deliver supplies in the snow.

[Ed Pawlowski]

Just because you can does not mean you should. If commercial flights are down it may be just as unsafe for military flights and to put the entire system in place in a few hours is not easily done.

In the scheme of life a 48 hour delay is not really a big deal.

[trader_4]

I guess when they came up with the statements they made the mistake of thinking people had some common sense. What does Uncle Joe say?

[gfretwell]

I am not the one complaining but you really shouldn't need that much planning to fly a box from Massachusetts to Florida and I certainly hope in the 21st century our military is not afraid of a little snow. If so Europe is in trouble if the bolsheviks get frisky because they love to fight in the snow. Ask the Germans or the French.

[Scott Lurndal]

Amongst many other failings, you're clearly not an expert on logistics.

There was a long article in AW&ST recently about the logistics of vaccine delivery. When it requires such unusually low storage and transport temperatures, transportation becomes more difficult.

For example, almost half the cargo weight is for the dry-ice used to preserve the vaccine. And because frozen CO2 sublimates, there are issues with CO2 generation during transport which further restrict the volume that can be transported in a single flight.

The estimate was something close to 8000 747 sized cargo flights to fully distribute the vaccine in the USA, IIRC.

[invalid unparseable]

Just copied this from today's paper:

The COVID-19 vaccine event at Dover International Speedway will begin Sunday, a day later than originally planned, due to inclement weather elsewhere in the country and expected in the region this week.

The state said the weather is affecting travel for federal personnel who will help run the vaccine site.

[Ed Pawlowski]

It is not flying one box to Florida though it is flying many boxes to many locations. Do we need a C5A to move one box? What is the cost and time to activate the military for a one time thing to maybe save a day.

My $16 order from Amazon was delayed too but I'm getting by without military intervention.

[gfretwell]

Dunno about cost but how much have we spent a half $billion keeping the National Guard in DC for a "one day event" that was over before they got there and now all of the protesters are home. The Guard is still there, not doing anything. Wasting tax pater money is what the government is good at. I was just pointing out we are expending a lot of federal dollars maintaining vaccination sites but there is no vaccine to use there. Maybe we should be looking at a way to get around a little snow. Too bad we don't have competent leaders to deal with it. Oh wait, that was last year's excuse. Joe is on it.

OTOH I am not really that concerned that I haven't gotten my call for my shot but other people are frantic. I was just addressing their concern. You folks are right. Calm the f*ck down, the snow will melt some day.

[micky]

A later story, maybe from a different radio station, said that Tennessee was frozen in. The big Fedex hub. They said Kentucky too. Ah, UPS has its main hub in Louisville.