Celebrating Mother Earth, Decontaminating Meth Labs
Next week's American Industrial Hygiene Conference and Expo will offer something for occupational and environmental health and safety professionals of all stripes. The premier event in the industrial hygiene field will take place at the Colorado Convention Center in downtown Denver May 22-27, with the exposition portion starting Monday, May 24.
This year's enhanced Expo blends new additions, such as the Expo Theater, Soap Box Talks, and the photo display Holding Mother Earth Sacred, with mainstays like the cyber café, message centers, lunch discussions, and technical poster sessions.
The Expo Theater, sponsored by the Colorado Safety Association, will feature 18 organizations presenting 15-minute demonstrations followed by five minutes of audience Q&A. Exhibitor product demonstrations will be held Monday through Wednesday and available online post AIHce. The new Soap Box Talks session, happening Monday from 2:30 p.m. to 4 p.m., will give participants five minutes to share their thoughts, ideas, and opinions about current and emerging industry topics and five minutes to answer audience questions.
Holding Mother Earth Sacred is a photographic display portraying the significant contributions made by various Native American communities to the development of energy resources, job creation, and preserving worker safety. The display is a collaboration among photojournalist and The Quiet Sickness author Earl Dotter, Cindy A. Becnel, and four tribal communities. Additional details about the display can be found at www.aihce2010.org/aihce10/pdf/MotherEarth.pdf.
Also on display on the Expo floor, sponsored by the National Alliance for Drug Endangered Children, the Denver North Metro Task Force, and the Denver North Metro Fire Rescue, will be the must-see Endangered Children Decontamination Trailer. This unit is designed as the first step for children found in a meth manufacturing environment. It is a decontamination facility engineered for children and also is the location for the child’s first medical evaluation. These children will be removed from their homes and must leave everything behind due to toxic contamination. North Metro’s goal is to have the trailer serve as a gateway that is safe and where the child is provided for, acknowledged, and cleansed. The trailer responds at the request of any first responder agency for incidents involving children from as far south in the state as Castle Rock and as far north as Longmont.
The AIHce 2010 website features a floor plan of the Expo hall and a convenient exhibitor locator so conference goers can map out a schedule of booths to visit before they arrive in Denver. The AIHce 2010 virtual Expo can be accessed at www.aiha.org/expo2010. See you next week!