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It can be surprisingly easy to take something in broad daylight without anyone noticing. I once worked at a computer workstation company that was having financ
by tzs 3y ago
It can be surprisingly easy to take something in broad daylight without anyone noticing.
I once worked at a computer workstation company that was having financial problems. In the hardware engineering lab they had a large flatbed printer. The bed was several feet on each side and the thing was very heavy. It would take at least two people to move and would be a struggle to get through the door.
One day the hardware engineers got back from lunch and found that the printer was gone. They had last used it just before going to lunch, which had taken an hour. So it disappeared sometime in that hour. We later found out it was repo men repossessing it.
The hardware lab had no windows and one door. That door was on a hallway. From that hallway you could go left which would take you through the lobby to the front door, or you could go right which would take you past all the software engineering offices to the back door.
During the time when the hardware engineers were at lunch the receptionist was in the lobby, and one of the co-owners was in his office with the door open and from his desk could see the front door and much of the lobby.
The software engineers that day all either took late lunches or ate at their desks, so all four of us and our supervisor were in our offices on that hallway, with our doors open, and all of us had our desks oriented so we were facing our doors.
Not a one of us saw a damn thing. Somehow at least two repo men were able to stroll in and take that printer without anyone noticing.
That isn't the only case of something being seemingly impossibly moved I've experienced. In the early '80s I lived in this area of Pasadena, CA [1]. See that big building labeled "Crown City Adult Day Health Care"? That building was originally the Temple City Odd Fellows Hall and was unsurprisingly located in Temple City which was 4 or 5 miles away from Pasadena. The space it now occupies in Pasadena was part of that parking lot to the south.
Here's a street view of it to give an idea of its height [2]
I was living in the apartments next to that lot on the north. One day they closed off the north part of the parking lot and started preparing a foundation for a building there. I thought they were going to build a new building there.
Then one day signs went up that the south part of the lot would be closed for a while. I went to bed that night, and when I woke looked out my window, and there sitting in the south part of the lot, on top of something like 200 wheels, was the Temple City Odd Fellows Hall. Apparently they wanted to use the site in Temple City for something else but the building had historical value so they couldn't just tear it down. So they moved it.
The building was not cut into sections and reassembled. The thing was moved whole. In one night. I spent quite a while afterwards driving all around that area and I could not find any route it could been taken on that would not have required a lot of moving cables or traffic lights or signs or trees out of the way. But I could not find any removed or cut trees, or any other sign that anything had been disturbed.
To this day I still have no idea how the heck they did it.
[1] https://www.google.com/maps/@34.1486783,-118.1378355,123a,35y,120.95h,45t/data=!3m1!1e3?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@34.1486783,-118.1378355,123a,35...
[2] https://www.google.com/maps/@34.1478366,-118.1369049,3a,75y,51.28h,88.8t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sj8wP3cJzoZ-noygX1rbMNw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu https://www.google.com/maps/@34.1478366,-118.1369049,3a,75y,...
- ChrisMarshallNY 3y agoReminds me of this story: https://www.carthrottle.com/post/nypd-busts-thieves-for-stealing-traffic-cams/ https://www.carthrottle.com/post/nypd-busts-thieves-for-stea...
- cgriswald 3y agoAccording to Wikipedia the building was built in Pasadena a few blocks away (175 N Las Robles) and not in Temple City. It was moved in 1987. I don’t know if that removes any of the mystery.