I stumbled upon this news article this evening when I was searching for something quite unrelated. The headline caught my attention – and as with most things that relate to schools, I had to take a peek.
‘School shut due to overwhelming smell of Axe body spray’
Initially I misread the headline, and thought it said ‘school shut down due to overwhelming smell of an axe’. Naturally, my imagination went into overdrive. Axe? Was there an axe wielding maniac running riot through the corridors of some unsuspecting school, and if so, surely this would have been making headlines all over the world?
It is amazing what you can conjure up in your imagination in only a few short seconds of misunderstanding.
I re read the headline. It really didn’t clear all that much up – although I was relieved that there was indeed no axe wielding maniac on the loose. I then noticed the picture attached to the article and surmised that Axe body spray is indeed most likely to be a US equivalent to our lynx body spray. That stuff does stink, I grant you that!
I did wonder how on earth body spray could possibly be responsible for shutting a school down. Maybe if they had used lighters to set fire to the spray as they held the nozzle down, replicating a flame thrower, and the school building had been burnt to the ground, then that I could understand. But simply spraying a few cans of smelly boys underarm around seemed a bit far fetched.
I appreciate that it can be overpowering and a little full on, but to render a school to a point of shut down seems a bit over the top. I will concede that these cans of spray do have the unfortunate side effect of making one gag. I have certainly told off enough students over the years for ‘stinking’ out the cloakrooms. I have however, never called in the emergency services to deal with an over zealous spraying incident.
Still, to shut a school down, and have the emergency services called in because of a ‘hazardous smell’ seems a little bit of an over reaction. Its body spray, not a chemical spill! Furthermore, 8 students were transported to hospital and 2 others were taken to see doctors by their parents! I cant decide if I should roll my eyes or stifle a giggle. I repeat, its body spray.
Here in NZ we have a fairly simple and cheap solution to the problem.
We open the doors and windows until the offending smell dissipates.
Perhaps we should run workshops overseas. You can’t beat simple kiwi ingenuity, and common sense now can you?
You can read the article here! body spray shuts school down
Oh – as an aside- its not the first time body spray has resulted in the emergency services being called in. There are two other small articles at the bottom of the main article. Who would have known….