Safety Wars
Safety from a point of view that you didn't see coming.
Episodes
Host Jim Poesl opens with a tribute to Star Trek's Walter Koenig, who died at 90, then pivots to the real question: what's your plan when someone dies at work? He argues safety pros need pre-written scripts, attorney review, and empathy—not speculation about cause of death. Feature Story News covers Israeli elections as a referendum on October 7th, a US-brokered ceasefire in Ukraine, and Fed rate expectations. The DOL segment...
Jim Poesl covers workplace fatality preparedness—emergency contacts, pre-written plans, and advance funeral arrangements to spare loved ones from emotional decisions. News includes a deadly Spain train crash, Iran peace overtures via VP Vance, MSHA's clean record on mine violations, and EPA's rollback of Biden-era oil/gas rules. He also dives into U.S. nuclear readiness drills, UK conscription age extended to 65, poll manipul...
This Oct 22, 2026 episode of *Safety Words* (Safety FM, Jim Poesl) covers suspicious letters sent to election offices, echoing the 2001 anthrax attacks, plus a Feature Story News roundup: UK websites down from a PHP vulnerability, French protest bans, Ohio's contentious governor race, and the US-China AI regulation debate. DOL updates include $81.5M rural workforce grants, $10.5M for mine safety training, tipped-employee rule chang...
25 years after the 2001 anthrax attacks, Jim revisits the biological contamination event that shaped his career — and asks why we failed to learn from it. Drawing from the National Academy of Sciences' "Reopening Public Facilities After a Biological Attack," he walks through the timeline: the first victim at AMI in Boca Raton, the NBC letter addressed to Tom Brokaw, the Hart Senate Office Building shutdown, and the five lives...
Jim hosts from a hotel lobby, covering the day's safety and regulatory news. He opens with his standard disclaimer about OSHA/EPA citations and presumption of innocence, then dives into political commentary on the upcoming elections and the cycle of unfulfilled promises.
Feature Story News covers Pope Leo's lung cancer surgery, US inflation at 3.7%, Taiwan's $4B Alaska LNG investment, Russian strikes on Ukraine, and Saudi-Houthi con...
In this episode of Safety Wars, Jim questions why both parties keep replaying the same playbook ahead of the 2026 midterms with no bold proposals. Feature Story News covers Pope Leo XIV's lung cancer diagnosis, Tupac Shakur's murderer sentenced, the Pentagon's plan to livestream an execution, and Houthi attacks in the Red Sea. Jim debuts two original songs—"On Vulture's Wings" and "Love is a Safe Workplace"—sharing the ...
Safety Wars: Cornell — Accountability Is Necessary, Prevention Takes More
In this 33-minute Safety Wars episode, host Jim examines the Cornell sexual assault case — dubbed the "Cornell Seven" — through a safety-investigation and human-organizational-performance (HOP) lens. Drawing on a Slate article by consultant Hannah Scotland, Pulsel argues that punishment alone won't prevent the next catastrophe: individuals ma...
September 30 Hijacks, Hazmat, and Half-Truths
In this September 30 episode, host Jim covers the heroic Israeli plumber who landed a hijacked Flydubai flight after learning controls from a TV show, drawing parallels to post-9/11 aviation vigilance. He reports that OSHA's 2026 penalty inflation adjustment is canceled due to a federal funding lapse that prevented BLS from releasing required October data. Jim stresses the importance of ...
This episode covers OSHA's citation of a Florida pipeline contractor after a fatal struck-by incident, willful lockout/tagout violations at a New Jersey car wash, and $65 million in community college training grants. Jim shares personal stories about noise survey failures at a warehouse that led to costly settlements, and an indoor air quality audit that debunked a cancer cluster at a law firm. The EPA segment covers glyphosate rev...
Jim from Safety Wars covers soaring diesel prices, Trump's UN speech on Iran, and rising tanker insurance in the Strait of Hormuz. EPA updates include $82 million for San Francisco Bay watersheds, lead cleanups in Indiana and Montana, and a Clean Air Act settlement in Puerto Rico. For National Preparedness Month, Jim dives deep into disaster readiness: water storage strategies, emergency food and food safety, reading severe weather...
Methylene Chloride, Muddy Rivers, and Diesel Spikes
**Summary:** Jim is back from Vermont where he's working an EPA hazardous waste cleanup near the Beetlejuice filming location. The episode dives into the Fifth Circuit's overturning of EPA's methylene chloride rule, explaining why odor is an unreliable warning for the carcinogenic paint stripper and why air sampling—not your nose—should guide worker protection. Ji...
On the 25th anniversary of 9/11, Jim Poesl of Safety Wars shares his personal experience witnessing the attacks from Hoboken, then examines their lasting safety and policy legacy. He recounts the chaotic Ground Zero recovery, the lack of respirators, and Christine Todd Whitman's EPA assurances that the air was safe—despite warnings from industrial hygienist Jeffrey Olcott. Jim questions accountability, sovereign immunity, and...
Star Trek at 60: The Final Frontier Is Us
This episode of Safety Wars opens with Jim reflecting on attending the Star Trek Original Series Set Tour in Ticonderoga, NY for the franchise's 60th anniversary. He shares a written tribute arguing Star Trek was never really about space — it was about humanity's potential for cooperation over conquest. Drawing on a 2010 fan survey and the show's diverse cast of captains (Kirk, Picard,...
Safety Wars 9-3-2026 When We Fail to Watch Out for Each Other
Jim opens Safety Wars discussing the Lindsay Clancy postpartum mental health trial, arguing society readily condemns individual mental health crises while ignoring the ~5,000 annual workplace deaths caused by negligent leaders. He connects this to broader failures in caring for coworkers, wives, and family. News segments cover an Iran-US missile strike investigation, El N...
This episode of Safety Wars opens with disaster preparedness tips for National Preparedness Month, covering assessing hazards, building emergency plans, and stocking 72–96 hours of supplies at home and work. A quick news roundup follows, touching on US-Iran tensions, the Ebola outbreak in the DRC, Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong's guilty plea, Nepal's landslide death toll, and NASA's newly launched Roman Space Telescope.
The co...
Safety Wars – August 26, 2026 (Simple Sabotage Edition): How Saboteurs Hide in Plain Sight at Work
Jim Poesl opens with FSN Radio News: Meta's $18B child-safety settlement with 29 states, Canada's retaliatory tariffs on the US, Prince Harry and Meghan's return to Britain, and new US sanctions on Iran. He then digs into RFK Jr.'s public clash with PA Governor Shapiro over measles deaths and vaccine misinformation, questio...
Safety Wars 8-25-2026 Dolly's Legacy, OSHA's Deadly Kettle Fines
This episode of Safety Words opens with a tribute to Dolly Parton, who passed away at 80, highlighting her advocacy for literacy and education. The show then covers international news: US Treasury sanctions targeting entities tied to Iranian oil smuggling and nuclear procurement, Pakistan's efforts to broker US-Iran peace talks, and China-India border negotiations. A s...
Safety Wars 8-19-2026 AI Data Centers, Flock Cameras, and the War on Common Sense
Summary:
This episode of Safety Wars covers a wide-ranging mix of safety culture, tech policy, and current events. Jim opens with disclaimers and housekeeping before discussing how to handle difficult or psychopathic personalities in the workplace—stressing immediate, professional responses rather than escalating to HR.
The show moves into news hea...
**Summary:**
This episode of Safety Wars opens with a call to speak up—both in society and on the job—before diving into news headlines covering Iran-U.S. tensions, the Meta youth mental health trial, and Ukraine's drone strikes on Moscow. The host then shifts to the core theme: safety professionals often become "victims of their own success," letting bullying or intimidation from workers go unaddressed because past prof...
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