Amazon Driver Told to Keep Working as Deadly Tornado Barreled Toward Town

When tornado warning sirens went off before a deadly Dec. 10 tornado struck Edwardsville, Illinois, an Amazon delivery driver was told to keep delivering, despite the dangers.

The driver was even threatened with the possibility of losing her job if she came back to base, text messages accessed by Bloomberg News show.

At around 7:08 p.m., the driver messaged her supervisor, writing, “Radios been going off,” to which the supervisor replied, “OK. Just keep driving. We can’t just call people back for a warning unless Amazon tells us to do so.”

At first, the driver replied, “Just relaying in case y’all didn’t hear it over there.” But then thirty minutes later, tornado alarms nearby went off, and the driver relayed the news back to her supervisor.

The supervisor gave back a shocking response: “Just keep delivering for now. We have to wait for word from Amazon. If we need to bring people back, the decision is ultimately up to them. I will let you know if the situation changes at all. I’m talking with them now about it.”

The driver protested, saying, “How about for my own personal safety, I’m going to head back. Having alarms going off next to me and nothing but locked building around me isn’t sheltering in place. That’s waiting to turn this van into a casket. Hour left of delivery time. And if you look at the radar, the worst of the storm is going to be right on top of me in 30 minutes.”

“It was actual sirens,” she added.

In response, the supervisor issued a warning: “If you decided to come back, that choice is yours. But I can tell you it won’t be viewed as for your own safety. The safest practice is to stay exactly where you are. If you decide to return with your packages, it will be viewed as you refusing your route, which will ultimately end with you not having a job come tomorrow morning. The sirens are just a warning.”

The driver maintained her protest, saying, “I’m literally stuck in this damn van without a safe place to go with a tornado on the ground.”

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The supervisor finally responded, saying, “Amazon is saying shelter in place. I will let you know when they say anything else to me. [Driver name] you need to shelter in place. The wind just came through the warehouse and ripped the rts door and broke it so even if you got back here, you can’t get in the building. You need to stop and shelter in place.”

The text conversation quoted above comes from messages Bloomberg News shared in their report of the incident. A source familiar with the incident confirmed the authenticity of the messages, the outlet reported. The driver, according to the source, Bloomberg News reported, was around 30 miles away from Amazon’s facility in Edwardsville.

“This was a developing situation across a broad geographic area, and unfortunately the delivery service partner’s dispatcher didn’t follow the standard safety practice,” Kelly Nantel, a spokesperson for Amazon, said in a statement, according to Bloomberg.

“This dispatcher should have immediately directed the driver to seek shelter when the driver reported hearing tornado sirens. While this text exchange was going on, the local Amazon team was ensuring each delivery service partner had directed their drivers to shelter in place or seek shelter and advised them to stop delivering for the evening. We’re glad the driver is safe and we’re using the learnings from this incident to improve our policies and guidance for delivery service partners and drivers. Under no circumstance should the dispatcher have threatened the driver’s employment, and we’re investigating the full details of this incident and will take any necessary action.”

The warehouse mentioned in the text conversation refers to Amazon’s Edwardsville facility, whose 11-inch thick concrete walls collapsed when battered by the tornado, k*****g six workers who were stranded, unable to get into the designated safe zone.

Related: 'Mass Casualty Event': Amazon Warehouse Destroyed, Multiple Medical Crews Swarm Scene
The deaths and the interaction between the driver and the supervisor raised questions about the safety standards at Amazon Inc.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration is investigating the warehouse collapse, a spokesman from the Labor Department announced Dec. 11, according to Bloomberg News.

Former and current Amazon workers who spoke to Bloomberg News said that while they got instructions for situations like fires and tornadoes, the company organized no drills that familiarized them with the standard operating procedures so they wouldn’t land in confusion during an emergency.

According to the workers, Bloomberg News reported, the training that new hires receive include simply knowing where the emergency exits and assembly points were.

A Midwestern Amazon warehouse employee responsible for training new hires told the outlet that on multiple occasions he suggested that the company organize fire and tornado drills. But they did not fulfill his requests, the outlet reported.

“I would not know what to do with a tornado at all,” another person, who left the company year ago, told Bloomberg News under the condition of anonymity. “No one knew where they were supposed to be going.”

https://www.westernjournal.com/report-amazon-driver-told-keep-working-deadly-tornado-barreled-toward-town/?utm_source=Email&utm_medium=WJBreaking&utm_campaign=breaking&utm_content=western-journal&ats_es=489ee1ba734a5f1f055e6be09233f635

In the event you are unaware that insanity now encompasses the US Supreme Court, the Court ruled in 2020 with only three dissents that a person’s g****r is self-declared and unrelated to biological fact. The consequences of the Supreme Court’s elevation of fiction over fact are now showing themselves.

A female middle school child declared herself to be male, but the school prevented her from using the boy’s locker room. A naked girl showering with naked males was not the school’s idea of family values. However, a local court in Blue Springs, Missouri (57,000 population) ruled that as the girl said she was a boy, she had to be believed. The school had singled her out on the basis of her female g*****lia and ruled that she was female and not eligible for the boys’ locker room. This decision based on biological fact the jury decided was discrimination and awarded the girl $4 million dollars. https://www.rt.com/usa/543444-missouri-school-t*********r-bathroom/

This is a good example of what I mean when I say that in the US facts no longer matter. A country in which counterfactual claims take precedence over fact is a country soon to be bereft of scientific and technological capability.

“Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad”. …..Madness, unreasonableness, fierce senselessness is the order of the day here in our times

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2021/12/paul-craig-roberts/america-is-erasing-herself/

Lawsuit challenges cops' ability to search private lands without warrant
'Petitioners do not want their members to accidentally shoot a wildlife officer while hunting'
Bob Unruh By Bob Unruh
Published December 18, 2021 at 6:02pm


A new lawsuit has been filed in state court in Pennsylvania challenging the practice that law enforcement officers can search private lands and property – at will – without a warrant.

The case is being brought on behalf of the Punxsutawney Hunting Club and the Pitch Pine Hunting Club against the Pennsylvania Game Commission and commission officer Mark Gritzer by the Institute for Justice.

The legal team explained the problem:

Imagine spending July Fourth with family in the beautiful forests of the Allegheny Mountains. You’re sitting on the porch on private land, enjoying the peace and quiet and making memories. Then, a man storms up out of nowhere and says he’s been watching you for days with binoculars from a hidden spot on your property. Most people would call the cops. But in this story, the intruder was a cop—specifically, a Pennsylvania Game Commission officer surveilling Pitch Pine Hunting Club member Jon Mikesell without permission and without a warrant.

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The IJ reported the situation "is one of countless examples of wildlife officers snooping around on private land. Pitch Pine Hunting Club and its neighbor, Punxsutawney Hunting Club, have experienced these intrusions for years. Wildlife officers think they can get away with it due to an arcane legal rule called the 'open fields' doctrine, under which private land gets no constitutional protection from warrantless searches."

"These clubs are private places where generations of h****rs have come to spend quality time with their sons, fathers and close friends," said IJ Attorney Joshua Windham. "If Pennsylvania wildlife officers want to snoop around property that is so plainly private, they need to get a warrant."

The clubs have been around for generations, and the filing explained their properties are marked with "no trespassing" notices. All members are required to follow all laws and regulations.

"Members of the public recognize that the club is private property and do not enter unless invited," it explains.

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Club president Frank Stockdale said, "People should feel secure on private property. They should feel like they have privacy and seclusion. But the Pennsylvania Game Commission is making us feel the opposite—we feel invaded."

"There are certain things you think you have as a property owner. You have No Trespassing signs, you expect privacy, and yet this guy’s walking in camo on your property like he owns the place," Jon Mikesell said. "Do we have any rights?"

It was a state court that ruled in 2007 that the state's ban on warrantless searches does not apply to private land.

The IJ said, "This flatly misreads the Pennsylvania Constitution, which has unique text protecting 'possessions'—including private land—from such intrusions."

The court ruling "was wrong," IJ Attorney James Knight said. "Pennsylvania’s constitutional text and history make clear that private land deserves strong protection from warrantless intrusions—and we intend to prove it."

The clubs are suing under Article I, Section 8 of the Pennsylvania Constitution. They are seeking a declaratory judgment that the statutes authorizing wildlife officers to conduct warrantless searches of their land are unconstitutional, and an order enjoining the Pennsylvania Game Commission from conducting future warrantless searches.

"A victory here would have an impact far beyond the hunting context," IJ Attorney Daniel Nelson said. "It would reestablish core constitutional protections for private landowners throughout Pennsylvania."

State officers, however, regularly "enter private land without probable cause or any suspicion that a crime is being committed to search for evidence of potential state hunting offenses."

Landowners are not notified of those searches, the lawsuit said.

"During these warrantless searches, the commission's wildlife officers sometimes roam around private land for hours looking for evidence of potential state hunting offenses," but that destroys the privacy of the property.

Gritzer, in fact, is accused of concealing himself on the property, using camo, and watching residents with binoculars for days at a time.

The clubs, therefore, "are not able to offer their members the full degree of privacy from unwanted intruders that members expect," and, "many of the petitioners' members have reported experiencing anxiety over the fact that wildlife officers can surveil them, follow them around, or stop them…"

The practice also is "dangerous," the filing explains. "Petitioners do not want their members to accidentally shoot a wildlife officer while hunting simply because they were unaware of the officer's presence."