Interior temperatures of over 120F. Mail carriers discussing cooking meals on floorboards. Some postal workers literally dying from heat. To be an American postal delivery worker in a Grumman LLV in a hot part of the United States is to sweat. And sweat. And drink water. And struggle to get one tiny fan to keep you from having to take so many breaks that you can’t get your job done. Let’s talk about the Grumman LLV and its lack of air conditioning, which is absolutely ridiculous in 2024.
Recently, I found myself sitting at a stoplight next to America’s mail-delivery workhorse, the Grumman LLV (see below). I looked inside and spotted a fan — not a fan integrated nicely into a dashboard, but a fan you might expect to see in a toll booth or dormitory. An afterthought.
A few days later, I saw a mail carrier delivering packages in Santa Monica (see photos after the one directly below), and I asked her about the climate control system in the vehicle: No, they do not have AC, she told me. There really is just a fan.
A Woefully Inadequate Fan
Seriously, this fan is all that drivers of Grumman LLVs get other than whatever airflow comes through the latched-open doors:
And apparently the fan is woefully inadequate, with Redditers on the r/USPS page who apparently drive these machines daily writing:
I mean I knew the fans in the LLVs just blew hot air around but didn’t think it was even HOTTER than the air already inside the LLVs. ????
And:
[The comfort fans] just turn that oven on wheels into an air fryer on wheels.
Here’s another:
So dash fan it is which it’s mostly for looks as it doesn’t do anything but blow hot air.
Not only is the fan apparently inadequate, but it’s also loud:
I wish the fan wasn’t so loud.
Someone replied to that with:
It’s such a high pitched squeel.
Here’s another post about the fan’s noise:
That noisy ass front fan blows nothing but hot air and dirt in my face!
The Heat Can Be Deadly
As someone who works in the San Fernando Valley, where things become stiflingly hot in the summer, I know that a fan isn’t going to cut it in traffic. In fact, back in 2018, a USPS driver named Peggy Frank died while delivering mail on an especially hot day in the valley. From the LA Times:
The United States Postal Service is facing nearly $150,000 in fines after the heat-related death of a Woodland Hills mail carrier last summer.
Peggy Frank, 63, was found dead in her non-air-conditioned mail truck on July 6, the same day temperatures in the Los Angeles neighborhood hit a high of 115 degrees.
The Los Angeles County coroner’s office listed Frank’s primary cause of death as hyperthermia, an abnormally high body temperature resulting from exposure to extreme heat.
The article goes into what the USPS should do to keep its workers safe on hot days, writing:
During heat waves, employers should allow workers to take more frequent breaks than usual, monitor workers for signs of illness and provide employees with water, rest and shade, according to Department of Labor guidelines.
Here’s more on the incident from OSHA:
The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has cited the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) for a repeated violation of OSHA’s General Duty Clause following the heat-related death of a Southern California mail carrier at the Woodland Hills Post Office.
The employee suffered hyperthermia while delivering mail in July 2018 when the outdoor temperature reached 117 degrees. The general duty violation addresses USPS’s programs and procedures for employees working in high-heat situations. The postal service was also cited for a repeated violation of recordkeeping requirements related to recording heat stress incidents. Proposed penalties total $149,664.
“The U.S. Postal Service knows the dangers of working in high-heat conditions and is required to address employee safety in these circumstances,” said OSHA Oakland Area Office Director Amber Rose. “USPS is responsible for establishing work practices to protect mail carriers who work outdoors from the hazards of extreme temperatures.”
An alleged mail delivery driver on the online forum “Rural Mail Talk” discussed how their local office was handling the news of the tragic 2018 death:
We had a stand up about this carriers death the day after it happened…But we were told how we should slow down and cool off, drink plenty of fluids when we become over heated…So, I ask you. Does management care?
Here’s a reply to that “Does management care” question:
— Sure, but just enough to cover their assets in case there was a heat-related incident. Then they could point to a stand-up given, posters in the office, or info passed along via the scanner.
— Just be sure not to spend more than 10 minutes parked in the shade to deal with the heat or risk a third-degree of questioning why you were in one place for so long.
— Should manglement complain about too many to the drinking fountain to get hydrated before heading out to the route — just ask manglement if they would rather you be away from the case for a few minutes during the morning or have you laid up in the hospital, possibly for several days due to a heat-related incident — or worse.
Interior Temperature Measurements, Cooking Food On The Floor/Dash
By the way, the 2018 thread that the two previous posts on “Rural Mail Talk” are replying to is called “How hot is your LLV?” It contains measurements by self-identified mail delivery drivers of the temperature inside the cab. Here are some of those measurements:
The small camping thermometer I used to put on the dash board pegged out at 120 F degrees in the summer time. So no doubt is was actually hotter than that.
Here’s another one from someone claiming to be an Arizona-based mail carrier, who mentions actually cooking food on the floorboards (it’s not clear if this person is serious, but it seems so):
I took the Lazer temp and tested the floor of the llv. It was only 100 yesterday and I got readings up to 162. It’s supposed to be 116 tomorrow. I’m thinking malassas cookies or neopolitan pizza. This will be my summer of quests. If life gives you an oven – bake!!
Today, in my llv, I cooked vegetable gyoza with ginger/soy sauce for dipping. It was pretty good. I have some seniors I deliver to and they have started to give me suggestions. So, everyday this week I stop for a couple minutes for lunch and we rate the meals. One gentleman said he made grilled cheese all the time in Korea on the ambulances. Hhmmm, I do like me some cheese!
Here’s a similar discussion on a Reddit thread:
The best thing though is putting chocolate chip cookies on the dash in summer time. So good and melted by lunch they taste like they’re fresh from the oven lol
In a 2020 thread titled “Heat in LLV” — also on Rural Mail Talk forum — one person claims to have seen 150F measured on their dashboard:
The person included a bit more info besides that in the screengrab above:
Yup its crazy… I was just reminded of it from someone else’s pic of 120°.
And the MDD daily safety of something like,,,”all heat conditions are avoidable” or ” heat related illnesses are preventable”…or something to that effect, was just Thursday or Saturday this week.
The person who had apparently posted the 120F photo replied, writing:
Yes, but I place mind on the mail tray next to drivers seat. Not in the sun. I record the temperature my seat is experiencing as that is closest to my temperature experience.
I record, for family members, on my 4240 in case we have an incident of medical heat emergency. Most employees at the office have told their families to go after the USPS if they die from effects of delivery.
That comment above about noting temperatures as a way to hold USPS accountable should something happen is grim, but a Rural Mail Talk forum member named Morty wrote something similar in the aforementioned “How hot is your LLV?” thread. From Morty:
I’d keep a thermometer in my LLv and record the highest temp. Itd have to be digital and mounted on the dash. After 2 weeks, give your report to the PM along with a 1767 and a phone call to OSHA if your temps exceed safe temps. When you die, your family will have better stance to sue.
How Do We Fix This?
So what’s the solution? The obvious one is: Get new delivery vehicles that come with AC. The Grumman LLV, which has been in service since the mid-1980s, and was not originally designed with AC in mind. To retrofit it would be prohibitively expensive, especially for the USPS given its severe funding limitations. In fact, according to Online Safety Trainer (an organization that teaches workplace safety), the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission vacated multiple OSHA citations because of a lack of feasible technical solutions to the problem. From Online Safety Trainer:
In a recent series of decisions, the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) weighed in on the ongoing debate regarding excessive heat hazards and the United States Postal Service (USPS). The OSHRC vacated four of five citations issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) to USPS for excessive heat exposure to letter carriers in Benton, Arkansas; Houston and San Antonio, Texas; and Martinsburg, West Virginia. The commission concluded that OSHA failed to identify economically and technically feasible prevention measures USPS could have implemented.
However, in the fifth case, the panel determined that a Des Moines, Iowa, USPS station failed to provide heat safety training for City Carrier Assistants (CCAs) and remanded the case to a review commission administrative law judge (ALJ).
One Redditor breaks it down how the age of the LLVs is the reason behind the lack of air conditioning, and goes on to voice frustrations on just how egregious the situation is:
Every year some lawmaker introduces legislation named after a carrier who has died from heat stroke and says they’re going to work to getting the trucks retrofitted. Then it goes silent until next summer when the same thing happens again.
I’m pretty bitter about the political grandstanding they’ve done on workers’ deaths.
Anyways to answer your question for real, it’s because they weren’t built with it. Those trucks are missing a lot of features that would shock people: no air-conditioning, no airbags, no anti-lock braking, and more. It’s legal because the vehicles were built before those things became mandatory so they are grandfathered in.
As far as heat-related OSHA complaints go, it also should be allowable since carriers are supposed to have an unlimited number of “comfort stops” and breaks must not be limited to cool down and drink water.
However, OSHA has levied mounting penalties onto USPS for heat-related fatalities and injuries. USPS management frequently punishes carriers for going overtime even in instances where the delay is from need to take cooling breaks.
Investigations every year show examples of management telling carriers to “use approved breaks to cooldown.” The implicit instruction here is, of course, that cooling down outside your lunch break is “unapproved.” Even though that isn’t true, and they know it, even if a carrier knows it as well it can still lead to improper safety conduct. In the past, management has been caught saying explicitly “take as many cooldown breaks as you need, but also we will be issuing discipline for those who take more than 8 hours to finish their route.”
So yeah, it’s bonkers and it’s not going to be fixed soon. The new fleet won’t even begin to go into production unatil 2023. The first vehicles won’t be driven by carriers til 2025 at the earliest and they won’t finish building all of them until 2031. So probably more deaths to come until then…. which is a fucked up but real thing to say.
Again, grim.
To be sure, there are some LLVs that feature a rear fan (see above), which is apparently quite helpful. Here’s a comment about it from Reddit:
In Florida. These are our “air conditioners” as they draw air through the rear vent. Better than the dash fan but still not good enough once it reaches about 90.
Here’s a reply:
yeah, I’m in SW Florida and that side fan is good/decent when it works but mine decided to crap out today(on one of the hottest days of course ), so I had to rely on that god awful dash fan along with frequent stops in shaded areas cause I was overheating and feeling faint.
Here’s a response to that reply:
Ugh. Same. I have the only LLV without the side vent AC. So dash fan it is which it’s mostly for looks as it doesn’t do anything but blow hot air. I actually bought a Dewalt fan that I attach to my visor area. It works ok along with my seat cover fan. But yeah today my LLV got to 98 and it’s only March. I’m def not acclimated to the heat yet either. I had to stop and drink a body armor. Gonna be a long spring at this rate my friend
Another Redditor in another thread writes:
I have one in my llv..I love it..it’s quiet and blows just enough air on you to keep cool. That noisy ass front fan blows nothing but hot air and dirt in my face!
That’s supposed to go thru the bulkhead and blow in the cab area, not the cargo area. I had one in an LLV that got totaled, reg carrier asked me to take it out of the wrecked one before it was sent off. I (VOMA) had it installed in the LLV that replaced the wrecked one. Carrier couldn’t live without it! I can understand why. Blows 1000X better than that comfort fan. Those just turn that oven on wheels into an air fryer on wheels.
User hey-yall-watch-this responded:
The air from it feels better because it’s being pulled from outside rather than from the blazing hot air at the dash/windshield area that useless fan blows on you.
Again, that dash fan is a steaming pile of junk.
There’s also a device called a — and I’m not making this up — “cooldataz,” which is advertised to help LLV drivers stay cool. Similarly wild is a Rural Mail Talk user named Guin’s solution:
I put drain pipes on the doors of my llv. I use ties to attach them, as you drive, the wind gets directed into the llv. For routes that stop box to box get a smaller sized pvc pipe. Drops the temp on the inside to about temp outside and you get a nice breeze. I have a few customers on my route that looked at me crazy the first time they saw them but when they asked what they were for they were both fascinated and highly amused.
How absurd.
The real answer to the mail carriers’ heat-problem is the vehicle you see above — the Oshkosh NGDV. It cannot come soon enough:
Hopefully USPS is prioritizing hot climates for the rollout. Mail carriers have sweated long enough.
I’m sympathetic to the mail carriers, but an air-conditioned vehicle may not be the best solution. It’s been proven that repeatedly going from a cold to a hot temperature is hard on the body, as you never become adapted to the heat. Not that a postal van with AC would get that cold, because the window is often open. Air conditioning in the cargo hold would have a benefit, though, for keeping heat-sensitive cargo fresh and undamaged.
If I had such a job, I’d go out and buy a cooling vest. They start around $40. They contain slim packs of that common blue thermal gel that you chill in the fridge overnight. Combine that with a gel-filled neck scarf and you can shave 20 degrees off the apparent temperature, and it works in or out of the vehicle.
I think that’s nonsense. We all love AC and use it in our cars all the time. Delivery drivers do the same all over the world. Cooler is safer.
What? Do folks still think it’s 1972?
Going outside used to be tolerable in my hometown. Now, with every slapdash apartment complex blocking the coastal winds and stifling any airflow (dare I say the big double c word our great leader has banned?) you just sit in these puddles of 98 at 90% humidity. Drying out the air with the A/C at least gets rid of that humidity.
It isn’t the best solution, I agree. But unless you’re game to throw out every politico, even ones you agree with to get better building codes it’s going to be the best possible solution.
Umm, cars in hot climate countries have AC. It’s mandatory in fact.
So the cargo deserves AC but the meat pilot can do without?
I’m sympathetic to the mail carriers, but an air-conditioned vehicle may not be the best solution. It’s been proven that repeatedly going from a cold to a hot temperature is hard on the body, as you never become adapted to the heat. Not that a postal van with AC would get that cold, because the window is often open. Air conditioning in the cargo hold would have a benefit, though, for keeping heat-sensitive cargo fresh and undamaged.
If I had such a job, I’d go out and buy a cooling vest. They start around $40. They contain slim packs of that common blue thermal gel that you chill in the fridge overnight. Combine that with a gel-filled neck scarf and you can shave 20 degrees off the apparent temperature, and it works in or out of the vehicle.
I think that’s nonsense. We all love AC and use it in our cars all the time. Delivery drivers do the same all over the world. Cooler is safer.
What? Do folks still think it’s 1972?
Going outside used to be tolerable in my hometown. Now, with every slapdash apartment complex blocking the coastal winds and stifling any airflow (dare I say the big double c word our great leader has banned?) you just sit in these puddles of 98 at 90% humidity. Drying out the air with the A/C at least gets rid of that humidity.
It isn’t the best solution, I agree. But unless you’re game to throw out every politico, even ones you agree with to get better building codes it’s going to be the best possible solution.
Umm, cars in hot climate countries have AC. It’s mandatory in fact.
So the cargo deserves AC but the meat pilot can do without?
Another point to be made:
Going to electric vehicles would also greatly reduce the heat from the drive train working its way into the cab. The (sub)urban routes don’t get the trucks moving fast enough to clear out the hot air around the drive train.
Another point to be made:
Going to electric vehicles would also greatly reduce the heat from the drive train working its way into the cab. The (sub)urban routes don’t get the trucks moving fast enough to clear out the hot air around the drive train.
Back in the mid 80 many personal vehicles didn’t have AC and i would suspect that very few fleet/work vehicles had AC. The fact that the mail carriers still have to use vehicles from that time frame is the real crime and its not just the AC issue. Hay here’s an idea they need to hire DT to keep these piles going for another decade!
Back in the mid 80 many personal vehicles didn’t have AC and i would suspect that very few fleet/work vehicles had AC. The fact that the mail carriers still have to use vehicles from that time frame is the real crime and its not just the AC issue. Hay here’s an idea they need to hire DT to keep these piles going for another decade!
It’s not just mail carriers who have to endure the heat. I worked for 34 years at UPS, and those brown boxes could easily hit 130 degrees in hot weather. The new contract demands AC, but only in new equipment. None of the existing trucks.
And don’t get me started on heat in the winter.
It’s not just mail carriers who have to endure the heat. I worked for 34 years at UPS, and those brown boxes could easily hit 130 degrees in hot weather. The new contract demands AC, but only in new equipment. None of the existing trucks.
And don’t get me started on heat in the winter.
I’d love to see one of those YouTube fabricators buy an LLV and hack it to run cooler, like retrofit a safari roof, fan-assisted swamp cooler, better fan technology, or old Land Rover style “scuttle vents” (or old school VW vent windows)… find a away to cycle air through the entire vehicle to keep the temps down. I’d bet the 3D printing community could come up with some solutions as well.
(in reality, they would probably focus on putting a boosted Hyabusa engine in it)
I’d love to see one of those YouTube fabricators buy an LLV and hack it to run cooler, like retrofit a safari roof, fan-assisted swamp cooler, better fan technology, or old Land Rover style “scuttle vents” (or old school VW vent windows)… find a away to cycle air through the entire vehicle to keep the temps down. I’d bet the 3D printing community could come up with some solutions as well.
(in reality, they would probably focus on putting a boosted Hyabusa engine in it)
What’s also wild is how little postal workers are paid, particularly compared to UPS/FedEx etc. Most employees top out in the mid $30’s/hr but start at around $22. The “private” guys earn almost double. It will be interesting this summer as contracts are up for negotiations…
If you really want to go into a depressing rabbit hole, bypass the Reddit stuff and go to YouTube. There are a gazillion vids from USPS workers telling it like it is working there. The healthcare bennies recently changed for the worse, and while having a pension sounds sweet, it’s not nearly enough to live on long term.
Sure, it’s better than flipping burgers, but it’s a pretty shitty job overall.
This guy covers the agency really well as an employee…
https://www.youtube.com/@MrFinesse316
It’s also wild that people in the US think $60k a year is poorly paid. And also that (if you’re right), FedEx/UPS workers are on something like $100k a year. In the UK posties get pretty close to minimum wage, so more like £25k (~$30k) a year.
Depends where you are
60k a year is poorly paid, but for a job that is 6 days a week, starts at like 4am, and exposes you to angry dogs, angry humans, and all weather conditions it is EXTREMELY poor pay.
Sure, relative to US pay it’s not all that much considering the demands. But it puts someone in the top 1.1%, globally.
A lot of good that does them. If only they could commute from Sri Lanka to their job in Seattle every day.
It’s adjusted for purchasing power.
$60k is not nearly enough money in 2024. After taxes (state dependent) and let’s not forget health insurance, which as previously noted is not good, $60k gets a single adult a VERY modest lifestyle. Add in a spouse and a kid or two? Life gets tight real quick.
I mean, it’s obviously not going to make you rich. But it’s very good pay for an unskilled job. In a lot of parts of the US it’d make you pretty nicely off; in the expensive parts, you obviously won’t be buying a big house, but it’s still hardly poverty-stricken like people here are implying.
For comparison, a postie in London earns about £25k a year, and that’s in a city where housing is significantly more expensive than almost anywhere in the US.
Healthcare is free in London. Going to the ER with heat stroke in the US could easily bankrupt you if your household is only pulling in 60k annually.
USPS gets federal health insurance and a pension. Carriers won’t be living the high life but that’s not terrible for the skill level.
The USPS federal healthcare plan is extremely subpar compared to other government healthcare plans, like what Railroaders get.
The pension isn’t a true pension, rather it’s a wonky version of a pension. It’s too complicated to break down here, but it is super easy to google.
I did a bunch of research on the USPS when I almost accepted a job with them not too long ago.
Didn’t the UK privatize their postal service a while back? And, didn’t that privatization also result in hundreds of sub-postmasters being falsely prosecuted due to software errors in their poorly designed Horizon system? It sounds like the poor pay of the UK posties is due to the now-privately-run nature of the service. And to think – some in the US have been agitating for a privately-run US Postal Service!
It was privatised, yes – though it’s a weird privatisation with lots of requirements to provide a universal service and so-on. The shareholders have not done well, on the whole. Posties’ pay has risen since privatisation, compared to under government ownership.
Sorry, the facts are complicated and can’t be used to support whatever ideology you prefer.
You cannot buy any house AT ALL in my area on a 60k/yr income.
You can barely rent comfortably for that around here.
Cost of living is (obviously) completely dependent on where, in fact, you live. So blanket statements about salary are pretty worthless.
UK posties don’t have to pay for healthcare.
No, because this is a civilised country. But they still have far lower take-home pay.
Interesting. So is it fair to say you think the whole $2 raise I got at the largest manufacturing employer in the area somehow threw the market so out of whack it necessiated a doubling in rent for most non-section 8 developments and me having to move back home?
Whut?
I’m trying to illustrate that $60k isn’t living large anymore and might not even be a comfortable living even in a modest burg of ~50k.
Apples and oranges. I mean it’s almost like you’re describing a different country.
Weird
What’s also wild is how little postal workers are paid, particularly compared to UPS/FedEx etc. Most employees top out in the mid $30’s/hr but start at around $22. The “private” guys earn almost double. It will be interesting this summer as contracts are up for negotiations…
If you really want to go into a depressing rabbit hole, bypass the Reddit stuff and go to YouTube. There are a gazillion vids from USPS workers telling it like it is working there. The healthcare bennies recently changed for the worse, and while having a pension sounds sweet, it’s not nearly enough to live on long term.
Sure, it’s better than flipping burgers, but it’s a pretty shitty job overall.
This guy covers the agency really well as an employee…
https://www.youtube.com/@MrFinesse316
It’s also wild that people in the US think $60k a year is poorly paid. And also that (if you’re right), FedEx/UPS workers are on something like $100k a year. In the UK posties get pretty close to minimum wage, so more like £25k (~$30k) a year.
Depends where you are
60k a year is poorly paid, but for a job that is 6 days a week, starts at like 4am, and exposes you to angry dogs, angry humans, and all weather conditions it is EXTREMELY poor pay.
Sure, relative to US pay it’s not all that much considering the demands. But it puts someone in the top 1.1%, globally.
A lot of good that does them. If only they could commute from Sri Lanka to their job in Seattle every day.
It’s adjusted for purchasing power.
$60k is not nearly enough money in 2024. After taxes (state dependent) and let’s not forget health insurance, which as previously noted is not good, $60k gets a single adult a VERY modest lifestyle. Add in a spouse and a kid or two? Life gets tight real quick.
I mean, it’s obviously not going to make you rich. But it’s very good pay for an unskilled job. In a lot of parts of the US it’d make you pretty nicely off; in the expensive parts, you obviously won’t be buying a big house, but it’s still hardly poverty-stricken like people here are implying.
For comparison, a postie in London earns about £25k a year, and that’s in a city where housing is significantly more expensive than almost anywhere in the US.
Healthcare is free in London. Going to the ER with heat stroke in the US could easily bankrupt you if your household is only pulling in 60k annually.
USPS gets federal health insurance and a pension. Carriers won’t be living the high life but that’s not terrible for the skill level.
The USPS federal healthcare plan is extremely subpar compared to other government healthcare plans, like what Railroaders get.
The pension isn’t a true pension, rather it’s a wonky version of a pension. It’s too complicated to break down here, but it is super easy to google.
I did a bunch of research on the USPS when I almost accepted a job with them not too long ago.
Didn’t the UK privatize their postal service a while back? And, didn’t that privatization also result in hundreds of sub-postmasters being falsely prosecuted due to software errors in their poorly designed Horizon system? It sounds like the poor pay of the UK posties is due to the now-privately-run nature of the service. And to think – some in the US have been agitating for a privately-run US Postal Service!
It was privatised, yes – though it’s a weird privatisation with lots of requirements to provide a universal service and so-on. The shareholders have not done well, on the whole. Posties’ pay has risen since privatisation, compared to under government ownership.
Sorry, the facts are complicated and can’t be used to support whatever ideology you prefer.
You cannot buy any house AT ALL in my area on a 60k/yr income.
You can barely rent comfortably for that around here.
Cost of living is (obviously) completely dependent on where, in fact, you live. So blanket statements about salary are pretty worthless.
UK posties don’t have to pay for healthcare.
No, because this is a civilised country. But they still have far lower take-home pay.
Interesting. So is it fair to say you think the whole $2 raise I got at the largest manufacturing employer in the area somehow threw the market so out of whack it necessiated a doubling in rent for most non-section 8 developments and me having to move back home?
Whut?
I’m trying to illustrate that $60k isn’t living large anymore and might not even be a comfortable living even in a modest burg of ~50k.
Apples and oranges. I mean it’s almost like you’re describing a different country.
Weird
We’ll have fully capable, autonomous robot mail delivery vehicles before a functional, climate controlled vehicle for human carriers is fielded. All the complaining (justified as it may be) almost guarantees this because the human is the weak link in the system and the USPS will welcome the opportunity to cull the work force. They’ll still raise the price of postage every three months, though, because they’ll be paying pensions til the sun burns out.
We’ll have fully capable, autonomous robot mail delivery vehicles before a functional, climate controlled vehicle for human carriers is fielded. All the complaining (justified as it may be) almost guarantees this because the human is the weak link in the system and the USPS will welcome the opportunity to cull the work force. They’ll still raise the price of postage every three months, though, because they’ll be paying pensions til the sun burns out.
My wife has a good friend whose husband is a mail carrier. I’ve only chatted with him once or twice, but he mentioned concern that he has hearing loss from the crazy loud fan in his LLV. We live in a dry area that gets triple digits in the summer but cools in the evenings, so I’m guessing they don’t have the neat rear cooler setup installed on any vehicles here. My local carrier also has a giant fan (12+” in diameter) mounted on the dash, and I can confirm the thing is louder than the Iron Duke powering the LLV.
My wife has a good friend whose husband is a mail carrier. I’ve only chatted with him once or twice, but he mentioned concern that he has hearing loss from the crazy loud fan in his LLV. We live in a dry area that gets triple digits in the summer but cools in the evenings, so I’m guessing they don’t have the neat rear cooler setup installed on any vehicles here. My local carrier also has a giant fan (12+” in diameter) mounted on the dash, and I can confirm the thing is louder than the Iron Duke powering the LLV.
As a regruntled former TE DCO for the USPS I can tell you that management, especially upper management, absolutely does not care. You are surrounded by posters and supervisors telling you how you’re an important and irreplaceable part of the organization but every single action and decision they make says the exact opposite. It’s borderline psychological torture levels of gaslighting.
We used to joke that if you died they would give you a half day off to attend your own funeral but you’d still get a red mark for missing the beginning of your shift.
In the old days we called it “going postal” but over the years that phrase got eclipsed by the sheer numbers of random mass shooters.
That’s the time period I worked there, mid-90s, it was in the news constantly and we were forbidden from using the phrase “going postal”. The funny thing was we were in a rougher part of town and all the businesses around us had car break-ins and such but ours never got touched. Apparently the USPS had street cred back then.
As a regruntled former TE DCO for the USPS I can tell you that management, especially upper management, absolutely does not care. You are surrounded by posters and supervisors telling you how you’re an important and irreplaceable part of the organization but every single action and decision they make says the exact opposite. It’s borderline psychological torture levels of gaslighting.
We used to joke that if you died they would give you a half day off to attend your own funeral but you’d still get a red mark for missing the beginning of your shift.
In the old days we called it “going postal” but over the years that phrase got eclipsed by the sheer numbers of random mass shooters.
That’s the time period I worked there, mid-90s, it was in the news constantly and we were forbidden from using the phrase “going postal”. The funny thing was we were in a rougher part of town and all the businesses around us had car break-ins and such but ours never got touched. Apparently the USPS had street cred back then.
USPS should harness this as an asset, develop a line of jerky, dried vegetables and herbs and sell them
Soylent RedWhiteBlue
USPS should harness this as an asset, develop a line of jerky, dried vegetables and herbs and sell them
Soylent RedWhiteBlue
What they should do is just air condition the seat itself. Or if you want to get real fancy, have a vest they can slip on, that pumps cold refridgerant through it, so the cold is right against the body.
Blasting the AC with the windows open just uses so much power. It’s much more efficient to cool someone down through the surfaces that actually touch the user. It’s why radiant floor heating makes people comfortable even if the ambient air temps are lower.
The cooled seat seems like the best stop gap solution.
Those setups have condensation problems in humid areas, which can be an issue since they’re powered. In damp climates the dehumidifying effect of regular AC is a big help since, under the air, sweating helps cool you down instead of dehydrating you and nothing else.
What they should do is just air condition the seat itself. Or if you want to get real fancy, have a vest they can slip on, that pumps cold refridgerant through it, so the cold is right against the body.
Blasting the AC with the windows open just uses so much power. It’s much more efficient to cool someone down through the surfaces that actually touch the user. It’s why radiant floor heating makes people comfortable even if the ambient air temps are lower.
The cooled seat seems like the best stop gap solution.
Those setups have condensation problems in humid areas, which can be an issue since they’re powered. In damp climates the dehumidifying effect of regular AC is a big help since, under the air, sweating helps cool you down instead of dehydrating you and nothing else.
We had a mail carrier in Dallas die last summer from the heat. Really sad. I hope his widow got a good settlement for losing her husband of 30+ years. His death could have been avoided. Crazy how after he died the usps changed their rules for cool down breaks in the metroplex, allowing for more of them.
We had a mail carrier in Dallas die last summer from the heat. Really sad. I hope his widow got a good settlement for losing her husband of 30+ years. His death could have been avoided. Crazy how after he died the usps changed their rules for cool down breaks in the metroplex, allowing for more of them.
Alternative title: Not a Fan
Or Hot delivery men/women in your area. Hah
Double post see witty comment below.
Damn I missed it. It should have been
“Click here for Hot GrumMan in your area” haha