torkell | (Reply)

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That must have been one hell of a thunderstorm to do that (given the lightning rods all over the place here). Probably a somewhat dodgy fire control system as well, if it was putting out enough of an electric field that it was a strike target. Just be glad it didn't hit a power feed, as that would probably have slagged everything plugged in. I know someone who was using their PC in a thunderstorm without a surge protector, and managed to kill the PSU, CPU, motherboard and probably stuff like the graphics card too for good measure.

Hmm, this reminds me of the time when a friend 'tested' a fire alarm by emptying half a can of deodorant into the smoke detector. At, oh, 1:30 am or something like that, just as everyone was staerting to go to sleep (IIRC I had just turned the light out when it went off). This was at the 6th form orientation away thingy, and the place we were at had a fire alarm system, but the teachers didn't know how to reset it (and the system didn't call the fire brigade either). So we had to wait about 15 minutes for the system to reset itself. At least we didn't have to go outside.
There's other fun from there. We did most of the seminars and stuff in a sorta hall that was just the other side of the road there, and there was a floodlight on the outside. Apparently, turning that flood on managed to pop the breaker a few minutes later.
Oh, and one of the room windows literally fell out, and smashed on an open window from the floor below. (This is the building that was scheduled to be basically ripped apart and rebuilt just after we left. It was still unchanged two years later)