for SCIENCE

[marcicat]

Okay, inquiring minds want to know, because a police car did a slow drive through the parking lot of the apartment complex yesterday evening, and I suddenly had All These Questions.

How do police officers get into apartment buildings? Or firefighters? Or EMTs? All the doors are locked, and it’s not a fancy electronic code lock, or anything; we have keys. They could buzz the apartment they wanted?

But that seems like it takes a lot of time! And what if it was an emergency? I was thinking they could get the building manager, but what if it was a Wednesday? (He’s not here on Wednesdays.)

And they could probably break down the door, I guess, or use one of those firefighter axes, but what if it wasn’t really *that* much of an emergency? Like, not a chopping down the door kind of situation?

So then I thought: this must be true of tv apartment buildings too! How are people always getting into apartment buildings on detective shows and stuff?

HOW MANY STORIES HAVE I WRITTEN THAT DID NOT TAKE THIS INTO ACCOUNT?

Mirrored from The Marci Rating System.

Comments

[noxelementalist]

See https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20060629201559AAKs7NE

Basically it's 1) use a master key, 2) use the key in the lockbox, 3) get the building manager, 4) ask another resident to let them in, 5) pick the lock, or 6) break down the door. And in certain situations they are allowed to use force.

[marcicat]

Thank you! The info is totally helpful (I will need to look more carefully at the building entrance!), and I had so much fun reading the yahoo link answers on my lunch break. My favorite was that there was an electronic device that allows them to open gates, "sort of like Magneto, but it's a different kind of signal." That's my kind of explanation!

[noxelementalist]

Anytime!

[starandrea]

That's an awesome thread. I enjoyed this one:

We were worried about our neighbor, and called the police.
They broke her door in when no one answered .

( we had not seen or heard from her in several days)

turns out she was on a bingo trip and did not tell anyone.
well she had a boarded up door when she got home