Oh hey, my alma mater. Seems kinda weird anything cryogenic could be “unplugged,” since there’s a fuckoff-massive tank for liquid nitrogen outside the Low building… the tallest building on campus.
The article explains it. The freezer was wired through a disconnect box that was locked to prevent anyone from turning it off, but the janitor found the circuit panel and turned off the circuit breaker.
… yeah, and it’s kinda weird circuits were involved, when we have a mad-science supply of liquid nitrogen. I would have assumed that was the mechanism for keeping anything extremely frozen for decades on end.
I would have assumed that was the mechanism for keeping anything extremely frozen for decades on end.
Boy you’d think, right? Gravity-powered liquid nitrogen just makes too much sense. No, we’ll make it so it won’t fail unless the circuit box gets opened!
That is a bit over my head (my degree is in CompSci), but the research samples only had a 3C degree margin for error (77 to 83C) so I am assuming they had a good reason for using the setup that they had. Or maybe they were forced to accept that setup due to financial limitations.
Either way, privatization was 100% at fault here. The university wanted to cut costs (avoid paying benefits) so they outsourced the cleaning job to a private company who hired the cheapest guy they could. The outsourced company didn’t understand or respect their research and the guy they hired obviously didn’t either.
The article explains it. The freezer was wired through a disconnect box that was locked to prevent anyone from turning it off, but the janitor found the circuit panel and turned off the circuit breaker.
… yeah, and it’s kinda weird circuits were involved, when we have a mad-science supply of liquid nitrogen. I would have assumed that was the mechanism for keeping anything extremely frozen for decades on end.
Boy you’d think, right? Gravity-powered liquid nitrogen just makes too much sense. No, we’ll make it so it won’t fail unless the circuit box gets opened!
That is a bit over my head (my degree is in CompSci), but the research samples only had a 3C degree margin for error (77 to 83C) so I am assuming they had a good reason for using the setup that they had. Or maybe they were forced to accept that setup due to financial limitations.
Either way, privatization was 100% at fault here. The university wanted to cut costs (avoid paying benefits) so they outsourced the cleaning job to a private company who hired the cheapest guy they could. The outsourced company didn’t understand or respect their research and the guy they hired obviously didn’t either.