Fire escape in an ice storm

My life has been mostly indoors during the Great Blizzard of 2024, but at 4:30 a.m. today, the fire alarms went off. Ear-blasting sirens ring in each apartment, and I was too groggy to remember where my ear plugs are, so I stuck my fingers in my ears and turned on the in-house camera on my TV. It shows the lobby on the ground floor, and if there were a real fire and not just a false alarm, as we often have when someone burns a pot of beans, there would be a sign hung in front of the camera saying “Evacuate the building immediately.” That sign has never been used in the fifteen years I’ve lived here. New residents take the elevator down to the lobby (as I did when I was new here), bundled up in winter coats over their pajamas, wild-eyed and worried. I watched them from the comfort of my couch this morning.

After about twenty minutes, a fire truck arrived, despite the streets being sheets of ice. Three firefighters strolled into the building without helmets or equipment. They must have known that it was the usual false alarm. They unlocked a control panel and turned off the alarm. I took my fingers out of my ears.Two of them went to the elevator, presumably to notify the resident whose smoke alarm had triggered the system.

This morning we have freezing rain, but the temperature is right at 32F/0C, so the ice is beginning to melt. Out of curiosity, I went to the exit window by the fire escape, and this is what I saw. Every rung of the fire escape is coated in thick ice, and the side-handles are also icy. I live, as I have mentioned, on the 10th floor. It’s a good thing I didn’t need to use that fire escape. I don’t think anyone ever has used it, but this morning it is a death-trap.

What have I been doing with my time? Collecting information about RTX, the weapons-manufacturer with a facility near Portland. One of Sue’s sisters-in-law, a librarian, has helped with research. The Quakers have done most of the job for us in this excellent, very comprehensive article. I wonder what mental gymnastics and financial need drives people to work for such a company. What must it be like to know that the products of your labor are blowing people’s bodies apart?

I’m not yet sure how to use this information, but I go on collecting it.