On my thesis experiment at Fermilab, every now and then a channel in a NIM module would fail. If there were spare channels, we'd reroute cables and if not, we had to get the module replaced. Fermilab supplied these, and perhaps repaired some of them too, but that could take a few days and we were getting beam now, so several of us learned the art of “midnight acquisition.” Another experiment in the same area was in hiatus, awaiting funding for a new incarnation, and some of their apparatus was in storage. Somehow a key was acquired, and a swap made. Presumably when the other experiment was reassembled they found some defective modules, but they had plenty of time to get Fermilab to replace them.
I shudder to think what would happen these days.
About 15 years ago the national labs were told to address safety concerns, and told Tiger Teams would be visiting. Brookhaven blew them off, and wound up shut down for a while. Argonne got the message, but the teams still found lots of problems. Fermilab panicked. Lead bricks, those ubiquitous doorstops, had to go, even if wrapped in duct tape. Papers stacked 10 inches high on tops of filing cabinets—bad bad bad.
The big safety basics had always been in place—interlocks for the radiation areas, procedures for handling radioactive sources, mandatory OSHA training courses for university teams with members fond of standing on the railing of fully-extended Genies (That was a very dull week. I still have the book.) and so on. But that wasn't enough.
Years later, the Tiger Teams are gone, but the committees are going strong. There are safety courses for driving, recycling programs out the wazoo, and paperwork.
That paperwork is scary. It isn't enough to be a good carpenter or painter—you have to be skilled at filling out forms too.
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