Surprise Fire Drill

It is the start of the four days of PSLE marking. I doubt that the girls will really do their exam revision if I leave them at home. So I brought them along with me to work where there is no tv, no computer, no iPad, no telephone, no bed, no fridge. In other words, there is NO distractions for them at my workplace! :) I am cruel, I know lol.
They settled down at the empty work stations just next to mine and immediately started doing their revision - Marieann worked on her Science notes and Juliane did past-year papers on Math. I checked on them once in a while to make sure that they were on track. They were making good progress by lunch time. :) After lunch, we continued with our respective work.
Suddenly at 3.10pm or so, the fire alarm went off. The girls were spooked and asked if they should run. I told them to continue with their work since nobody was moving. :P Then came an announcement that they were checking the situation. Soon after, came the announcement that we had to evacuate the building. Argh. I was right in the middle of work... :(
Not wanting to risk it being a real fire, I told the girls to pack up their stuff and bring them along while I lugged my notebook as I haven't backed up my data for a while now. Won't be funny if I lose my data in a fire. We all moved out in an orderly (but somewhat leisurely, maybe because it was only a fire drill?! Not really the right attitude, I know) manner to the car park area. To make the fire drill exercise more realistic, there was a "fire" (lots of smoke, used a smoke bomb?), an "injured" person, and a fire engine also arrived with firemen to put out the "fire". The "injured" person was attended to while our attendance were taken to make sure everyone was accounted for. It was very hot standing in the sun and we were there for close to 30 minutes. When I was in school, 30 minutes was considered a fail as it was too long a time taken to account for everyone's safety. Actually it is quite shameful that we adults took far longer than school students would in a fire drill to evacuate to safety. :S By 3.50pm, we were allowed to return to our office. 

The fire engine, the Light Fire Attack Vehicle (LFAV aka Red Rhino) and the firemen

It was pure heaven to return to the air-conditioned office after the sweltering heat but it was hard to settle back to work after the interruption. But I think the girls welcomed the fire drill because it provided them with a break and some excitement for the day lol. :P