And they all fell down
I find a certain satisfaction in the meme “You had one job to do…”, because most of us have had a defining moment or two in the workplace. We try to do our best, to do right, and circumstances twist the plastic hose and…
Anyhow, today’s tip of the hat goes out to an employee of a territorial liquor store in Whitehorse. The shelving is standard; probably installed by someone else, and (I hope) functional for at least a day or two. Until the proverbial straw (or in this case, bottle of fine Scotch) took stability into untested realms. Just when they least expected it, the whole thing did what well-behaved shelving should never do. Please, a picture:
From this angle, not so bad. From below (and I hope there was no client in selection mode), not so good. According to the report on the CBC website, over $50K in retail loss (due to breakage). Half that value for insurance purposes, because government stores have a hefty margin of profitability. There was a video available, and from the timestamp, the incident occurred after closing time… “New shelving has been approved by structural engineers” was the clincher. Some poor guy thought that he’d read the installation page correctly.
I had some bookshelves do exactly that trick, in the basement. Books don’t break with as much of a crash and splash, but trying to get the novels back in order was challenging. I fully blame substandard screws. And now that those books are gone to a new home, I firmly resolve to not let it happen again. There; just like an Act of Contrition for the amateur builder.
