![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tugrikI work on the 11th floor of a downtown hi-rise building, directly in the flight path of the local airport. We get 'buzzed' all day. In the evening it's kind of disturbing as the planes' shadows cross the main windows just about the same time the sound peaks. It's not uncommon for folks to subconsciously duck, as if the thing just narrowly missed us.
At almost the strike of noon, just as a plane was mid-pass over our building at the loudest point, suddenly the lights flickered and a scarily loud, electric screeEEEA-BRRRZZRNT! went off. All the ceiling tiles on the south-facing side of the building flashed blue. A number of people hit the floor. I just grabbed my desk and held on.
The plane passed over without incident, but a moment later a second, louder explosion was heard, with an even brighter blue flash. We all rushed the windows.
Downstairs, about 200' from the bottom of the building is the shed for the parking garage's elevator. It houses a rather huge power supply that runs the hydraulic rams. The transformer in that supply let out all its magic blue smoke in those two bursts, complete with huge electrical flashes. As it's right below us it's hard to see unless you look waaay straight down, so nobody here saw the flash directly; we only saw its light being bounced off the roof as it projected up through the windows.
Moments later a bunch of stop-or-we-throw-our-keys security guards were out there, milling about confusedly. Fire broke out of the junction box and one of them hit it with a dry-chem extinguisher. Now they've set up a perimeter and are keeping people away from the shed, but otherwise it's calm.
From the looks of it nobody was hurt and only the ancient, krufty parking elevators suffered. So I don't feel bad at all in saying that this particular 'splosion was really dang cool.
At almost the strike of noon, just as a plane was mid-pass over our building at the loudest point, suddenly the lights flickered and a scarily loud, electric screeEEEA-BRRRZZRNT! went off. All the ceiling tiles on the south-facing side of the building flashed blue. A number of people hit the floor. I just grabbed my desk and held on.
The plane passed over without incident, but a moment later a second, louder explosion was heard, with an even brighter blue flash. We all rushed the windows.
Downstairs, about 200' from the bottom of the building is the shed for the parking garage's elevator. It houses a rather huge power supply that runs the hydraulic rams. The transformer in that supply let out all its magic blue smoke in those two bursts, complete with huge electrical flashes. As it's right below us it's hard to see unless you look waaay straight down, so nobody here saw the flash directly; we only saw its light being bounced off the roof as it projected up through the windows.
Moments later a bunch of stop-or-we-throw-our-keys security guards were out there, milling about confusedly. Fire broke out of the junction box and one of them hit it with a dry-chem extinguisher. Now they've set up a perimeter and are keeping people away from the shed, but otherwise it's calm.
From the looks of it nobody was hurt and only the ancient, krufty parking elevators suffered. So I don't feel bad at all in saying that this particular 'splosion was really dang cool.
