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Secret Lives of the Cleaning Crew
Posted June 19th, 2007 by rybolov
About 6 months ago, I had a fantastic run-in with the cleaning crew in my building. I was doing an early-morning data center visit to see what kind of activity was going on. While I was going through the mantrap, the cleaning crew was coming out. Some immediate observations:
- What are they doing unescorted in the data center?
- Who let them in?
- Holy Cr*p, they have a mop bucket full of water!!!!!11111oneoneone
Whenever I deal with the cleaning crew, I always feel linguistically-challenged. If they spoke Russian, then we could deal, but I am blissfully ignorant when it comes to Spanish (see, I have a mild chink in my armor =) ).
Anyway, I tried to explain to them that the electricity runs under the floor and how it’s just not safe for them to be mopping the floor with a wet mop, but the language barrier killed it. In the end, I gave up and told their supervisor just that they shouldn’t go in the data center.
Then I tracked down the guy who let them in unescorted. Some choice words were exchanged, I’ll leave it at that. =)
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4 Comments »
June 19th, 2007 at 2:37 pm
It is too bad that it did not involve rifle PT and a Flavor-Flav clock… 🙂
June 19th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
Sounds quite familiar, but data centre is usually not the place to worry most about.
This passage, though:
“In the end, I gave up and told their supervisor just that they shouldn’t go in the data center.”
brought back the memories of the data centre I’ve seen at one of my previous employers. Ennio Morricone composed a number of scores that one can hum to whilst watching the dust equivalent of tumbleweeds roll down the rows of racks. 😉
So, is Guerilla CISO guerilla enough to get his guys to clean up the data centre once a week/month? Cleaning up a data centre is a great team, and character building experience.
June 19th, 2007 at 9:37 pm
We do let them in escorted once a month with a DRY mop. =)
I haven’t seen much of a problem with long-term buildup of junk except for under the raised floor.
And before you ask, yes I have pulled tiles in the last 6 months. Gotta show the punks who’s the top dog from time to time. =)
June 21st, 2007 at 7:10 am
Hey, if you were in Chicago, you might have an easier time of it; most of the cleaning crews are Polish. 😉 Not quite the same, I know, but there’s also a substantial Russian immigrant presence there too.