Monday, March 21, 2016

The Health Department

I saw a man today wearing a pullover that said "Amtrak Health".  

He was nicely explaining to someone that he's an Amtrak Health Inspector, responsible for all the health-related issues like food-handling and sanitation aboard Amtrak trains both long distance and inter-city.  He has a doctorate in epidemiology and was very happy to describe his work, of which he is clearly and rightly proud.

I hadn't really thought about it that way before, but Amtrak trains are like ships, and both are basically little cities.  A long-distance train may have 600+ passengers on board for days, so obviously you need to worry about making sure the water is clean, the food is handled appropriately, and the toilets are clean and working.

Who'dathunk?

3 comments:

PseudoPiskie said...

Friends regularly travel from Erie to New York and back or Pittsburgh to Philadelphia and back. I'm glad they have a health inspector. Your commute is quite different. Your trains need a real cowcatcher in front and back.

Unknown said...

600+? Which train has a capacity of 600+?

IT said...

I was told that there were up to 600 on the coast Starlight when I took it a few summers back.