I hope you've all seen this short video:

If not, you should watch it before reading the post.

As I mentioned recently, I work for a large chemical company that includes several chemical plants. I am currently the Chief Technical Officer. I just came back from a meeting, I have a lunch break and I want to share this meeting with you immediately until I forget everything interesting.

So, two hours ago, a sergeant general director called me and said that in 5 minutes there would be a meeting on the technical condition of one of the plants and planning its repair. And he asks me:

"Do you have all the material on this?"

I answer her that I do not have, because my department has not yet dealt with this issue. She assured me that there was nothing to worry about and sent me a 40-page list of equipment. 40 pages! I didn't even have time to print them out before the meeting!

I came to the meeting without anything.

The introductory speech was given by the CEO, he told everyone that the weekend is ahead and it is necessary that all dangers were foreseen, everything was checked again ... He told many more pre-learned phrases, but I did not remember them, because at that time I read a comment from @the-gorilla.

Without reading the comment to the end, I heard the words:

"Let's move on to the topic of the meeting. Today we gathered about the incident that occurred on the railway. There was a fire in the tank with our goods."

My reaction:

"The Chairman of the Supervisory Board is in video communication with us."

My reaction:

"We also invited the Acting Head of Technical Department as an expert."

My reaction:

So far I have not even heard of any incident.

Then the head of the legal department took the floor, saying that the railway has claims against our company because a railway tank with our product caught fire in a village. This product was caustic soda.

The meeting became more and more interesting for me, as caustic soda is a liquid, as it does not burn under any circumstances. But since I was not given the floor, I watched on.

After that, the floor was given to the head of the corporate security department. He reported that the incident was a terrible blow to the company's reputation, as flaming liquid spilled from the railway tank and nearly burned human property.

Burning liquid! Caustic soda! If this dude made it light up, he would have won the Nobel Prize!

But the show continued.

The CEO was terribly angry and everyone tried to show him how competent they were.

The head of the personnel department reported that the workers who filled the railway tank were already giving explanations and that he was ready to fire them.

The head of the ecology department reported that the burning of the liquid apparently produced toxic fumes.

Then, the general director instructed the head of the labor protection department to develop firefighting measures to prevent the ignition of what could not catch fire.

The logistics department was tasked with looking for special rail tanks designed for flammable liquids.

Here I want to stop and remind you that this is a chemical company, and all the people who were at the meeting, one way or another should know something about different chemicals. At least about the ones we have in the factories.

Finally, the CEO asked me:

"What could have caused our rail tank to catch fire?"

I say:

"Nothing"

There was silence at the table for a moment. The Director-General then said:

"But somehow this railroad tank caught fire."

I say:

"It's impossible. Caustic soda doesn't burn under any circumstances, even if we want to set it on fire on purpose."

After that, the CEO accused me of incompetence, saying why they held a meeting if the fire could not happen.

I was no longer given the opportunity to speak. I kept watching what was happening. The atmosphere was heating up, everyone was starting to quarrel. All this lasted about two hours. Eventually, an employee of the logistics department entered the room and reported with a frightened look that he had been called and clarified that it was not our railway tank that was on fire, but another company's railway tanker with gasoline.

The show is over.

All images are taken from here: https://freepngimg.com/