FBI - Yet To Develop A Proper Database Management System
How lack of technology implementation and excessive database can mess up with each other was recently reflected in FBI’s Inspector General’s 120 page audit report in which FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigations) is presented in bad picture for not accomplishing time framed national security name checks in support of immigration and naturalization activities.
As from many of the reasons mentioned in the report for not completing the objective, the more important ones are quoted as “outdated and inefficient technology, personnel who have limited training, overburdened supervisors and inadequate quality assurance measures.” Interestingly, it is reflected that in many cases FBI is still depend on manual work for collecting data and records.
In United States any issue related to immigration and especially name check requires approval from an FBI clerk who further asks for information from 265 separate FBI record locations. The Washington Times was the first newspaper that published news about Audit Faults Delays in Immigrant Name Checks
However, there are many steps in accomplishing name check request depending on number of files an analyst must obtain, the location where a file is kept and amount of information that is contained in a file. In case file is placed locally, he can have access to it in matter of days. In case file is at any of the 265 different FBI locations then the information can be requested from that site. An electronically available file is very easy to retrieve.
For the files, which are not saved, electronically, lots of time on the part of analysts gets invested into searching through dispersed paper files. As mentioned in the report, “FBI files are currently stored at one of approximately 265 locations, including the FBI’s Headquarters facility, several warehouses around the Washington Metropolitan area, in records centers either operated by the NARA or commercial concerns, four large Information Technology Center facilities on the east and west coast, at each of the 56 field offices, many of the larger of our 400 resident agencies, and at legal attaché offices worldwide. This equates to approximately 1.8 million cubic feet of decentralized records storage, which provides some unique challenges to our efforts to be optimally effective and efficient.”
But there is a possible solution to the problem as also advised by FBI is central records repository where all the paper files can be kept on and further all active files can be stored, electronically, so it provides a very viable solution to the problem of data storing and management.
Subscribe to the comments for this postDangerous cargo transportation - need uniform consensus
Several issues has been raised after and it is still hot topic in debate in transport sector whether the recent changes in policies regarding the issuance of Container Packing Certificates (CPC) by the Port Klang, Malaysia is in line with international norms and regulation of United Nations regarding the cargo transportation.
There are so many safety issues as related to new norms issued by the Port Klang authorities, some concerned person expressed their opinion that certain security measures have not met the attention which they deserve in turn about of Container Packing Certificates. The core of this discussion is UN recommendation on the cargo transportation of hazardous goods.
At International level the transportation of dangerous good by sea route was viewed with a very serious note by the UN committee of Experts on the Transport of Dangerous Good in Geneva, in December 2000. The recommendations during this meeting introduced International Maritime Dangerous Goods (IMDG) code as a universal guideline for the transportation of dangerous goods by sea as framed from the 1960’s International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (Solas).
Under the law, a number of safety codes were issued regarding the recommendations for individual substances and operations for the flow of the goods and practices like terminology, packing, labeling, stowage, segregation and emergency responses action. Under guideline, the objects put under the category of dangerous goods are explosives, gases, non-flammable, non-toxic gases, flammable solids, organic peroxides, toxic and infectious substances etc.
So, the recommendations of the 2000 summit expected from all the Contracting Governments to ensure best security as according to the ISPS Code. During the 2000 Millennium Summit Secretary General Kofi Annan said,
“We will not enjoy development without security, we will not enjoy security without development, and we will not enjoy either without respect for human dignity. Unless all these causes are advanced, none will succeed.”
Safety at sea is a matter of grave concern for all those who are, related to security of ship. There are instances when a ship had to be scrapped due to the toxic spill from containers and damage was beyond repair.
However LPK, one of the authorities to issue CPC (Container Packaging Certificate) that was earlier in practice of issuing the CPC certificate even by a dispatch clerk neglecting all the security measures of highest importance. Soon after realizing the importance of CPC, LPK started issuing of LPK by properly trained competent and independent surveyors. It organized examination and selected the best candidates to issue CPC and appreciated by other port authorities and soon as the ports, local insurance companies, shipping lines from all over the world began full support to LPK, is suddenly scrapped all new CPC issuing system and all the system went into futile, further issued grave security concern for the cargo security at Port Klang, Malaysia.
Warehouses Of World War II Era Are To Be Dismantled
The price for modernization and modern infrastructure is being paid by one of the gigantic wooden warehouses that were made operational during the World War II as it was dismantled to make space for new intermodal rail terminal at the Port of Oakland and development area by the city of Oakland.
The warehouse one of the 800 series as huge to accommodate an aircraft carrier was the part of under construction Oakland Army Base and immediately put into the service when Japanese Bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. The warehouse geared out of service and closed down on September 1999. The warehouse located near rail and shipping lanes was constructed to support Army headquarters at Fort Mason in San Francisco.
The warehouse was the last US soil for thousand of troops who fought in World War II, the Korean War and Vietnam. At the place, it soon developed into Camp John T. Knight Army Base with administrative offices, barracks, dinning hall, officers’ club, bowling alley and a lot more. Dozens of other buildings that made up the Camp John T. Knight Army Base - administration offices, barracks, dining hall, officers’ club, bowling alley, gymnasium, mail center, library, dispensary and theater among them - have been torn down.
The job for dismantling the 800 – series was handed over to Zaccor Companies of Alameda who won the contract bid of $ 585, 000 for demolishing task. The company quite experienced in the dismantling job needs to take care of ware housing procedures as it is made of untreated and unpainted old-growth redwood and Douglas fir.
After the complete dismantling the thus restored raw stuff from the ware house needs to salvaged and recycled that is an expensive and time taken process, in which structures are segregated apart nail by nail, bolt by bolt so the material is not damaged anyway. The firm for the purpose has negotiated with Vintage Lumber Works and other companies to arrange sell out the scrap as collected from the dismantling of Warehouse.
Sovex Launches New TL6 Telescopic Vehicle Loader
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
Material Handling Specialists Sovex recently launched a new TL6 Telescopic Vehicle Loader. The TL6 is enhanced and has extra features with the company promoting it as the latest in revolutionary design and technology.
Sovex built this new model after gathering feedback from many of its clients. This ensures that the TL6 fits the exact needs of the company’s customers. Available with under-guarding throughout, the TL6 features a revised front end for added safety and user-friendliness. It is also easier to maintain and has reduced machine downtime.
If you want to have a look at this new model, you can check it out at IMHX 2007 in UK or you can contact Ben Kendrick on 0151 608 2323/ email ben@sovexsystems.com
Tips To Efficient Movement of Materials
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
Material handling is not just about moving something from point A to point B. What is more important is to ensure that the handling and moving of the material is done efficiently and effectively. Whether you handle scrap or finished parts, there are various things you need to check to ensure that you are using the right equipment for your particular application. For instance, material handling for stamping operations can be quite tricky. If you are planning to use a belt, vibratory, or a magnetic conveyor, you must first check out a few points.
One of the first things you need to know is the nature of the material being handled. Stamping presses form many materials, such as aluminum, stainless steel, steel, and other alloys. While you can use either a steel-belt or cloth-belt conveyors for the job, find out if the material being moved has any sharp edges. If yes, then a cloth-belt conveyer may not be a good idea since it can be cut.
You must also avoid a hinged-belt conveyer if there are sharp parts in the material being handled. These parts can easily get caught in the hinges of the conveyer causing a significant amount of downtime. The type of metal can also make a difference to the type of conveyer. For instance, if you are handling magnetic material, you can use a magnetic conveyor.
There is another problem that you must address when handling stamped material – lubrication. Most stamped parts have some type of lubricant on the material – which can be quite troublesome for the conveyer. For instance, lubricant can cause the material to stick to the belt of a belt conveyer. This material can then easily enter the conveyer housing, triggering a jam.
Next problem is the size and shape of the material. While it may not cause a problem in belt conveyers, magnetic conveyers can have trouble with this factor. All these issues show how challenging it is to select the most efficient conveyor for a particular application. To make the best choice, you just have to consider all operating parameters and ensure that you use the best equipment for the job.
Common Warehouse Mistakes
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
How does it feel when you are on your way to an important meeting and your car breaks down? Sheer frustration! Well, as the saying goes, “stuff happens”. And it happens in warehouses also leading to the best-laid plans for a new system going haywire.
So why is it that bad stuff happens despite meticulous planning? Probably because there’s some little glitch in the plan. Sometimes, we go ahead with complicated plans without laying the proper groundwork for accomplishing these goals. This could mean that your planned strategy doesn’t move at an efficient pace and you may end up spending a lot of time doing rework because you didn’t do things in the right order. Three common mistakes that could lead a plan astray are:
When you implement a new warehouse system or process, you should be able to expect the unexpected. Remember, ‘if something can go wrong, it will’. When a problem does occur, you must modify or adjust plan you prepared months in advance to keep pace with the changing scenario. You must not try to stick to your charted course of action when you know it is not the right path any longer.
You may have laid the groundwork and done the planning meticulously. But the best test of a system is when it actually works. If the system performs differently than was anticipated, you may have to modify it to meet your requirements. Similarly, in case the profile of orders and products being handled changes between designing and implementing a system you’ll have to modify the system to meet the new requirements. In such a scenario, ensure that everyone gets on board and signs off on the changes.
Any new process or system is always a team effort. To get the most effective system up and running, it’s important to not only identify a project team up front, but to also clearly identify every team members’ roles and responsibilities.
Expensive Is Not Always Best
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
Boys just love their mean machine toys, and nowhere is this love more apparent than in the material handling industry. Most of the people involved in the material handling and warehousing industry just love to show off the latest sophisticated material handling hardware. But these shiny huge toys need to justify their purchase on hard economic and operational improvement grounds.
It doesn’t help to buy the latest equipment in material handling only to discover that it doesn’t suit your requirements. So, before you even think of buying any new equipment systems, you must assemble all data pertinent to the performance requirements to be met. For this, you must get information on peak, average and seasonal requirements for both throughput and inventory, order characteristics information in terms of number of orders, lines per order and pieces per line and a few other factors.
Now you need to examine various alternative methods of accommodating these requirements must be developed. For instance you could check out the low-tech method, which requires the use of more manpower but has lower capital expenditure. Or you could try a mechanized method, which reduces the manpower input significantly but stops short of full automation. And if full automation is the best solution, you could even try that out. There are many other areas that you need to examine before you make your final decision. Let’s discuss them next time.
It’s Not All About Moving
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
The very name conjures up images of physical objects that need to be moved from place to place. What we don’t realize about the process of material handling is that nowadays, controls are playing an increasingly important role.
So when you think material handling, you cannot but think of conveyors – all kinds of them, then there are automatic guided vehicles; automatic electrified monorails, automated storage and retrieval systems… the list is endless. While you always did have something with which you could handle things, nowadays these devices are actually ‘smart’. What we now have is an array of choices that makes it difficult for any firm to decide what actually fits the bill for its operations.
So how does a company decide what kind of devices it requires to conduct daily operations? Some approaches to material handling are pretty personal. This means if a manager has specific ideas to improve efficiency and reduce effort, s/he gets the firm to make a switch. Then there are firms that need to keep up with technology changes and hence switch over to newer modes of handling materials.
What is interesting in this entire switch game is that the various types of material handling equipment don’t actually go away. This means, there is no wholesale replacement of one type of equipment in favor of another. What happens is a coexistence of sorts.
What is common amongst most firms is that they are quite conservative when it comes to material handling. The reason is not too far to seek – the cost of being wrong is incredible and can even hamper the very existence of a small business.
13 Amazing Logistics Stories
Traditionally, Logistics Management has been defined as an efficient flow and storage of goods from their point of origin to the point of consumption. The process covers a diverse number of functional areas such as transportation, traffic, shipping, storage, receiving and import/export operations. But over the years, Logistics management has become much more – it is now an important way for companies to reduce their costs and to improve their overall customer service.
A recent US study found that logistics costs account for almost 10% of the gross domestic product. Be it national defense, a manufacturing firm, a terrorist outfit, a space project, a courier company – how efficiently logistics are managed can make the difference between success and failure for them. So how exactly has Logistics evolved over the years?
1. Glass Recycling Logistics:
A process as complex as glass recycling (that involves collecting and sorting broken glass pieces of
every conceivable type and color; mixed with metal, ceramic, and other materials) would simply not be doable without detailed attention to the minutest aspect of logistics management. The state of the art glass recycling facility at ‘Visy Recycling Glass’ in Laverton is a classic example of success based on logistics management. It is the only facility of its kind within Australia that allows mixed and broken glass to be sorted into different colors, whilst removing high levels of contamination during the process.
The automated glass facility is fully computerized - each step of the process is accessible and adjustable through a computer monitored system. Using optical sorting, the automated glass facility identifies and separates the different types or colors of glass by taking individual snapshots of each piece of glass at high speed. Air jets are then used to shoot different types of glass into individual color streams.
The cameras used in the automated optical sort can sort up to a million individual pieces of glass per minute and can detect up to 16 million different colors in total.
“The facility was upgraded in 2005 and has driven glass recycling rates from 65,000 tonne to up to 120,000 tonne per annum or just under a 50% improvement in recovery rates since its completion.” (Powder and Bulk blog)
2. Largest Earth Mover in the World:
The bulldozing industry has tried to tackle the creation of a bigger and better earth mover for
decades. But because of the logistical problems inherent in the creating equipment of that size, it could not be done. That is, until the German company, Krupp; overcame the logistical problems to create the largest earth mover in the world.
Specifications: (courtesy American Top Ten blog)
- The mover stands 311 feet tall and 705 feet long.
- It weighs over 45,500 tons
- Cost $100 million to build
- Took 5 years to design and manufacture
- 5 years to assemble.
- Requires 5 people to operate it.
- The Bucket Wheel is over 70 feet in diameter with 20 buckets,each of which can hold over 530 cubic feet of material.
- A 6-foot man can stand up inside one of the buckets.
- It moves on 12 crawlers (each is 12 feet wide, 8′ high and 46 feet long).There are 8 crawlers in front and 4 in back.
- It has a maximum speed of 1 mile in 3 hours (1/3 mile/hour).
- It can remove over 76,455 cubic meters each day.(100,000 large dump trucks at 40yds. each)
3. Wartime Logistics – When Medics Had to Fight:
Military logistics management can spell the difference between defeat and victory for a nation. 
During the counterattack in the spring of 1951 against Chinese forces in Korea, the rapid advance of United Nations forces cut off many enemy units behind their lines. The Medical Company of the 21st Regiment, 24th Infantry Division (68 men), set up its tents near a rice paddy on the night of 26 May. 1LT John Atkins, the company administrative assistant, ordered that the guard be doubled that evening from four to eight personnel due to the rumors of enemy troops. It was a wise precaution. A surprise attack that night meant that some men who had never ever fired a weapon before had to hold their own until daylight – which they did!
“Any unit, CS or CSS, can find itself under attack in the "rear" areas no matter how secure it thinks it is. Sensible guard measures and quick reaction teams to cope with varying levels of threat are critical. If appropriate plans are taken, the mission can continue even during such an attack.” (Fighting Medics)
4. Improvising: Making Do with What You Have:
Here are some amazing pictures of ordinary people finding cost-efficient methods to do what needs to be done. (Warning: Use your discretion while viewing some of these pictures – they may be perceived as offensive by some people – especially by animal lovers/vegetarians.)
(Lords of the logistics – Part I)
(Lords of the logistics – Part II)
Planning Enables Efficient Handling
By Priya Jestin, Staff Writer
In material handling operations, efficiency plays an extremely important role. Efficient performance of functions helps ensure the success of the manufacturing or distribution industry. One of the biggest challenges material handling companies face today is of ensuring quality service at the lowest cost possible. As customers become more market savvy, they demand more services and stiff competition means more and more cost cutting.
This means to survive, a company must be able to do a successful balancing act. Agreed, increasing services while decreasing costs may sound contradictory, but it can be done… and profitably at that. For instance, there are quite a few companies that use computer aided design and computer simulation in planning material handling operations. This helps to minimize the number of handlings, and reduce distances that materials need to be moved. It also facilitates movement to increase speed, prevent damage and reduce labor. To put it simply, CAD makes it feasible to design and view possibilities that would have been too time consuming to draw by hand, permitting more thorough analysis.