Competition: Close Encounters of the Food Safety Kind

To add one that just happened and still has me scratching my head...

We contract towels, lab coats etc to a large national laundry company. Our local office has issues. This is an exchange with our new employee who is managing that account and my issues with them. Yes, including the top one...

Our facility does not process any of the big 9 allergens. We are a small RTE facility. They keep "retraining" the local manager and providing documentation to prove their cleaning.  2021-06-30_14-10-08.jpg   105.93KB   1 downloads

Sometimes those big national ones have some of the worst local offices. I was previously using a big national PCO, heck we even use them in 2 of our other locations. Just so happens that my branch down here in Texas is TERRIBLE. Busted them for not performing about $1,200 worth of services that they charged us for. Got all those credits. Decided I'd do their audit early since I had issues with them, and found over another grand over 6 months that they charged us for but didn't do. 

None of the other locations have this issue, just mine. I decided to drop them and go with Ecolab.

To revive a thread - this is another story from old times in Soviet Union, 1960s, about food safety in childcare. More than 30 kids from a nursery were brought by ambulance to ER, all having nausea, abdominal cramps, diarrhea and even asphyxia. Horror of horrors! Vomit and feces analysis shows DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) and arsenic. It was obvious the kids had food poisoning. The police started investigating the case right away. Upon arrival to the nursery, they found a head mistress committed suicide (hang herself). Kitchen search gave nothing: everything was shiny clean, no food leftovers, garbage bins were emptied. Then the police interrogated a cook: first, she kept silent, but then burst in tears and confessed. They cooked a rat – incidentally, of course! How it got into a pot with porridge – nobody knew, but it was discovered on the bottom of the pot, when the last portions of porridge were given to kids. After discovery, the shocked cook called management immediately – but the head mistress told her to throw a rat away and act as nothing happened. “What can we do now? Most of kids had already eaten. No worries, all microbes die when boiling. Shush! No word to anybody, if you don’t want to be dismissed!” But they didn’t take into account that a rat was a genius of adaptability. Rat eats everything, and accumulates a lot of trash, including toxic chemicals and heavy metals, in itself during its pretty long life. End of the story: six children out of thirty ended up in the cemetery due to stupidity and criminal negligence. 

Yikes. That probably wins the category for darkest story!

Woo this is going great.  Awesome folks.

It's going to take some sorting the winners. 

In the meantime, keep them coming.

Thanks,
Simon

Hello everyone, my story goes back 35 years, when food safety was based on GMP’s mostly. I was the new QC managers assistant back then in a chocolate facility. This facility had a large warehouse to stock the chocolate novelties (Easter Eggs, Bunnies, Christmas trees…) and the plants location was right next to corn fields – through out the years the facility had issues with mice.

At some point in time, someone though it would be appropriate to have a cat in the warehouse to hunt and catch the mice (cheap pest control solution). After a few weeks, the secretary of the plant managers was feeling bad for the poor cat – all he could have is a few mice a day, nothing else. So she started feeding the cat every morning with cat food and a bowl of milk. From that moment on, the cat stopped hunting and the mice population went up. We fired the cat and got a real exterminator for the job.

Hello everyone, my story goes back 35 years, when food safety was based on GMP’s mostly. I was the new QC managers assistant back then in a chocolate facility. This facility had a large warehouse to stock the chocolate novelties (Easter Eggs, Bunnies, Christmas trees…) and the plants location was right next to corn fields – through out the years the facility had issues with mice.

 

At some point in time, someone though it would be appropriate to have a cat in the warehouse to hunt and catch the mice (cheap pest control solution). After a few weeks, the secretary of the plant managers was feeling bad for the poor cat – all he could have is a few mice a day, nothing else. So she started feeding the cat every morning with cat food and a bowl of milk. From that moment on, the cat stopped hunting and the mice population went up. We fired the cat and got a real exterminator for the job.

Very sad story. Poor kitten, where did it go after firing? Hopefully, someone adopted it... 

This story is not that scary as the previous one. My ice cream client used to have a warehouse separated from the production plant. It was located just by the railway track, which downhill was overgrown with wild grass and shrubs having a lot of wildlife. I had my office in that warehouse building, and the various representatives of wildlife, brought to my attention weekly, included scorpions, spiders, birds, mice and even snakes. The warehouse operators found some of those sweet creatures early mornings when opening the warehouse doors. Luckily, nobody was harmed. Fainted office manager doesn’t count, right?

Hello again everyone, the following would classify as a bit gross and weird. I was working for a major candy manufacturer in Canada back then - and the company grew by buying smaller confectioners throughout Canada and moving operation to their main location. At one point in time, this company’s management was looking for new opportunities to grow - so they offered their expertise to the pharmaceutical industry to make throat lozenges for various pharmaceutical companies.

After a few years, they bought a small competitor that made mostly throat lozenges for 5 or 6 customers. This facility location was close to a river in a major city. Therefore had issues with pests (mouse and roaches). I was asked to manage this location and organized the move of the equipment to our main location. Just imagine this, this location was on a 3rd floor and the building owner was storing and selling grain on the first and 2nd floor. 

When we started to move equipment, we were surprised to encounter loads of roaches and mice everywhere - we even found dead mice electrocuted on electrical panels. everything we moved was infested - and this company was making lozenges and candies .

The move was long and needed to get a pest control service to treat every truck load prior to moving. I always wondered how this place could operate with this level of infestation.

That even sounds disgusting, not to speak of seeing the stuff! About pests: I was told by our pest control guy that one of our biggest meat plants in Toronto (don't want to mention their name) had so much infestation that he was feeling sick every time visiting the place. 

hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

there's only a couple of large meat plants in Toronto......................

well, at least the biggest offender "suspiciously" had their GTA meat plant burned to the ground (no one injured)

hmmmmmmmmmmmmm

 

there's only a couple of large meat plants in Toronto......................

 

well, at least the biggest offender "suspiciously" had their GTA meat plant burned to the ground (no one injured)

It's old - I'd say very old place, and smells super-rotten.

Several years ago I worked for a bakery (I don’t want to name it as you wouldn’t eat their products after this story – yet, they might’ve changed since then). They were making high class looking and tasting tarts, cakes, scones and other goodies. I came there as a consultant, so I visited them once a week. The owner was excited to finally have somebody to create HACCP documentation as they had zero paperwork of that sort, and no food safety system at all. I was promised to have all possible help from the management side to improve the facility and practices, and first couple months I got some assistance and cooperation. However, the problem of the company was that they cared mostly of the profit – which of course is normal and intrinsic to businesspeople. What was food safety to them? Just empty words not bringing any money, but just wasting it. My every visit was ending with a whole bunch of findings to fix: molded corners, greasy and slippery floors, not complete or lost records, no temperature monitoring activities, freezers with scattered items allover, lockers stuffed with God knows what, and even wholes in the walls. I struggled to address issues here and there, but once some were fixed – others popped up from somewhere else, and there didn’t seem an end of this disaster. However, everything changed when the company was about to have a huge and juicy contract with one of Toronto’s biggest food services – provided they would pass the audit. Boy, I didn’t recognize the facility when I came at the audit day! Where were all those dusty/moldy/greasy/falling apart rooms? I was met with shiny and glossy surfaces, neat shelves and freezers, and even the air smelled clean and lemony Of course, not everything went smooth with the audit, but at least I didn’t have to be ashamed of the cleanliness. Honestly, I’ve never seen such fast change of mind-set. Or it was more power of money persuasion?

This mysterious incident happened back in Soviet Union at one of the government meat processing plant. The economy of USSR was based on a system of state ownership of the means of production, collective farming, industrial manufacturing and centralized administrative planning.  At those times, all meat products were supposed to be made as per federal standards (GOST) stating ingredient names and percentage for every sort of sausage. The key word is “supposed” as in reality not always those standards were maintained. Why? Well, it’s hard to explain from my side without going deep to specifics of life in USSR, and would be hardly believed from your side even if you learned about those specifics. Say first, for stealing to gain money, second – it was kind of “soviet mentality” attitude to state property: if something belongs to the state then it belongs to nobody in particular, simply it’s nobody’s. So substitution was common: high-grade meat was replaced with low-rated one, spices reduced to minimum, cheese, cognac and other expensive ingredients were not added at all. Yes, you’ve heard me correctly, cognac and cheese were part of exclusive recipes as well as game meat, red wine, honey, cream, eggs and other yummy stuff. Long story short, one meat plant received a foreign-made automatic processing line for sausages – which came along with a group of technicians to install it. Ok, shortly the equipment was on place working flawlessly and so in the future – “though subject to strict adherence to the recipe” instructed technicians and left for Finland. In a week, they were back as the line broke down. Puzzled technicians scratched their head “How could it happen to new equipment?”, innocently-looking line supervisors shrugged “What do you know!?” Anyways, lost settings were adjusted and whistling joyfully technicians flew off. Guess, what happened shortly? Right – they were back. The situation started smelling like a scandal: running smoothly equipment failed shortly after maintenance staff were out of premises. Finally, the line was disassembled and replaced with some simpler and easy-to-manipulate equipment. Of course, the key for this mystery was simple: smart equipment refused working with substitute or reduced formulas, but this was not an option for sticky-fingered meat guys.  

Ha, this brought back a horrible memory. I had a customer do this with a whole intact spider – on the larger end of the scale by UK standards, perhaps 1x2cm for the body, and around 7-8cm leg span. They'd at least gone to the effort of putting the spider into some remaining product in the bottle, so it was kinda soggy when it arrived on my desk in the offending bottle. Not my favourite complaint as I'm something of an arachnophobe, but I dutifully extracted it, went outside and shook all my clothes out, gently placed it onto a grid to photograph, went outside to shake my clothes out, twitched at various imagined tickling sensations from the many spiders that probably weren’t present in my immaculately clean lab, emailed the photos to the relevant site etc.

 

I ended up getting an opinion from an expert arachnologist, who confirmed the species and that it wasn't indigenous to the country in which the product was packed – unbeknown to the consumer, the product was imported rather than made in the UK. They also confirmed that it would not be likely to still have all its legs attached after being in a liquid product that was mixed in a large industrial mixing vessel, passed through a 1mm sieve after mixing, then a 0.2mm sieve immediately before filling, and then pasteurised in-pack. And even if it had, it was in suspiciously good condition for something that had sat in an acidic product for multiple weeks, been shipped internationally etc.

 

I was normally pretty generous with telling customer services to send a free case of product even for some moderately tenuous complaints, but these people made me poke a dead spider so they got nothing but a very formal letter advising that their claim was very obviously fictitious, and if they wished to pursue it further then we’d be appointing legal counsel to deal with them, the bill for which would almost certainly be footed by them.

 

Thanks for sharing this - I have to ask - how did you get in contact with an expert arachnologist?! 

I am trying to think of any contacts I know should this happen to me, but I wouldn't know who to reach out to besides our local zoo ? 

Thanks for sharing this - I have to ask - how did you get in contact with an expert arachnologist?! 

 

I am trying to think of any contacts I know should this happen to me, but I wouldn't know who to reach out to besides our local zoo ? 

It was a bit of an odd one for me too, buit of googling to find universities and museums with relevant specialisms, and a couple of telephone calls sorted it - most of that type of institution are quite keen to generate extra income

Thanks for sharing this - I have to ask - how did you get in contact with an expert arachnologist?! 

 

I am trying to think of any contacts I know should this happen to me, but I wouldn't know who to reach out to besides our local zoo ? 

In the US - universities are the way to go. The Land Grant Universities have entomologists on staff. As part of their job, they have an 'extension' component. This means they answer questions for the public including identifying bugs, usually for free or at a minimal price. 

When I worked for the local extension, people would come in for this service fairly often. Usually it was a photo and staff would sent it on to the university to identify.

The grossest encounters were found for me during pre-op.  Early in the morning a normal operation shall have a pre-operational report to assure that we are set to hit the floor running once the staff is in. Everybody, knows that, right?

So as I am doing my -10ºF room and I always like to direct my flashlight between racks and behind them to assure there isn't any spilled pallets, or damages, or maybe some cookie dough.  However, at one point in my inspection I noticed a frozen spot of puddle water shining as it reflects the light and I decided to squeeze between the racks and take a closer look as condensation is an automatic failure.  As I take a closer look I noticed splatters on the racks immediately next to the puddle.  Long story short after looking for potential leaks in the roof we discovered that, the leak, was from someone that took a leak inside the freezer.

Two guys for the same issue, two different sites, different cultures and job duties.  Root issue, management, was too stringent when it came to bathroom breaks even though it was a below zero facility and employees snuck to take care of business.

The grossest encounters were found for me during pre-op.  Early in the morning a normal operation shall have a pre-operational report to assure that we are set to hit the floor running once the staff is in. Everybody, knows that, right?

 

So as I am doing my -10ºF room and I always like to direct my flashlight between racks and behind them to assure there isn't any spilled pallets, or damages, or maybe some cookie dough.  However, at one point in my inspection I noticed a frozen spot of puddle water shining as it reflects the light and I decided to squeeze between the racks and take a closer look as condensation is an automatic failure.  As I take a closer look I noticed splatters on the racks immediately next to the puddle.  Long story short after looking for potential leaks in the roof we discovered that, the leak, was from someone that took a leak inside the freezer.

 

Two guys for the same issue, two different sites, different cultures and job duties.  Root issue, management, was too stringent when it came to bathroom breaks even though it was a below zero facility and employees snuck to take care of business.

Wow, that's quite disgusting: why did they do their piss-job in the freezer, not outside? My second question would be - how stupid one can be not to realize the consequences of their dumb act? As Albert Einstein mentioned "Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity" though, he wasn't sure about universe:)

My guess is the freezer is the best place to do it and not get caught. Doing it outside would be a possible charge of indecent exposure and depending on if anyone underage was walking by or lives nearby,  placement on the sex offenders registry.

My guess is the freezer is the best place to do it and not get caught. Doing it outside would be a possible charge of indecent exposure and depending on if anyone underage was walking by or lives nearby,  placement on the sex offenders registry.

Well, depending where OUTSIDE is: I can only imagine someone doing that at the front of the building - though, backyard seems quite safe for that, eh?

Hi everyone, it's October 01, which means the competition is now closed.

We now enter the adjudication phase, which consists of me reading through all of your lovely stories.

Thanks for taking part and we'll be in touch with the results in due course.

In the meantime have a great weekend.

Best Wishes,
Simon

 

OK the long-awaited competition is finally here!

 

You’ve got food safety stories and we want to hear them.

 

Stories need to be more than a one liner and maybe have some photos, but apart from that just get creative.

• Funny
• Weird
• Scary
• Interesting
• Sad
• Odd
• Bad
• Happy
• Amazing

 

How to enter:

 

Post a comment on this topic with a title / short summary of your story and then attach the full story as a Word document, PowerPoint, pdf etc.

 

You can submit as many stories as you like, but please keep one story to one post/attachment.

 

Competition starts now and ends September 30, 2021.

 

Prizes:

 

Winners will be announced on a live webinar and posted here mid-October.

 

• 1st place - $250 Amazon Gift Card
• 2nd place - $100 Amazon Gift Card 
• 3rd place - $50 Amazon Gift Card

 

Winners will also receive a Close Encounters of the Food Safety Kind t-shirt

 

'Adjudication' is the word I am going to try to use today in a sentence.

'Adjudication' is the word I am going to try to use today in a sentence.

I was also wondering what that meant - but hey, English is my second language. I like sophisticated words - like "reciprocate" or "unequivocal":)

I like to show off now and again, it's not the correct word, probably.  It's a legal term.

Anyway I'm picking the winners and that's that!