HUH? Magnets Suddenly De-magnetising! Any thoughts...?

I'm currently at work, and where we work we have 2 big double doors that are held open by magnets, one upstairs and one downstairs. At the counter a coworker and I suddenly jumped when the doubledoors shut. they make quite a loud sound as they are approx 3-4 inch thick solid wood doors... However, no one was near the door before or after it closed...

Soon after that, a customer from downstairs came up to ask why those double doors down there had closed, and if they are supposed to be opened or not. Apparently he and his friend noticed the same thing, the doors, held open by a large magnet in the wall where a metal piece sticks out of the door, suddenly closed shut of their own accord...

We propped the doors back open a few minutes later using the magnets, and they held open just fine. As I walk back to my counter, I notice a small magnet that's usually sticking to the metal filing cabinet is lying on the floor. Nobody could have tampered with it (why would they anyway?)

It seems that some strange unknown force temporarily disabled magnetic attraction...? The doors upstairs and downstairs must have closed at the same moment, as we would have heard the sound of the downstairs ones closing from up here if they closed at seperate times... But the computers were all fine. I work north of seattle, WA in the northwest.

If anyone has ever heard of such a phenomena, or simply has some idea as to how this could happen, please post. Thanks

some kind of electrical surge maybe???

as far as I know, magnets lose magnetism when

-heated or chilled (unless designed for such use)
-sudden jolt or hit


i am no scientist, just basic Cliff knowledge (you know Cheers)

i believe electrical current zapping the magnet will also difuse the magnetism.

other people will have better answer for sure.

Interesting occurance to say the least.

[edit on 13-10-2009 by Le Colonel]

Sounds like the doors are held open with electrmagnets and a short of some sort caused them to fail for a short time, where I work we have doors that are kept shut with them unless someone scans their ID or the fire alarm goes off. Someone could have knocked the small magnet off by brushing up against it or the crash of the doors shutting could have ousted it from it's nesting place on the file cabinet.

Sometimes the magnets on my refrigrator all of a suddenly fall off when I am not in the room, of course this is caused by my 2 year old son...

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I'm pretty sure those are fire doors held open by an electromagnet. In case of a fire, the circuit is opened and the magnets lose power. The doors close, hopefully trapping the fire in a limited area. In case of power failure (during a fire or otherwise), the doors will also close.

I would guess that the magnet on the floor was a coincidence.

I doubt that there could have been any sort of massive electromagnetic pulse that would wipe out magnets on different floors, without also trashing the electronics in the place (computers, phones, etc.). Could be wrong, but you'd need one heck of a pulse, and that would have some noticeable effects.

Don't worry, just a glitch in the matrix.
I will guess since you said double doors and office, that they are fire doors. They are designed to shut on an alarm to prevent a spread of fire. A glitch, test or gremlins may have been the cause for activation of the system.

Magnets (even the non-electro-magnetic type) often fade in power over the years and need to be "re-magnitized." Just a thought.

Thanks for the replies! I don't know if they are held open by electromagnets, that's a good question to ask my boss next shift. As for the magnet being bumped and falling off the cabinet, I don't completely rule that out either.

It was a very weird thing. There's no fire, but perhaps whatever governs that system (if we have it) somehow malfunctioned and told the doors to demagnetize?

Maybe it's the reversal of the poles???
Maybe magnetic North is heading South just in time for Global Warming???

reply to post by mostlyspoons

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Well, I work at a hospital, and when the fire alarms go off, all the door magnets suddenly de-magnetize, and the fire doors shut.

So, was there a fire alarm? Or, does somebody have central control of the doors somewhere?

Regarding the other smaller magnet suddenly demagnetizing, that is weird. I've never heard of that!! We have magnets all over the pharmacy department, and they've never suddenly fallen when the fire doors shut. So, maybe there is something more than fire doors shutting...I haven't a clue, though.




[edit on 13-10-2009 by nikiano]

Run for the hills!

It's Planet X time baby!!!!

Magnetosphere interrupting our magnetic grid.

The begining of the shifting of the earths axis, all poles even magnet will become their polar opposite.

Taking a look at the NOAA magnetometer, the GOES-12 Hp plotting for the day looks strange. I've never seen these little "blank spaces" (appearing today, Oct 13th) along it's trace:





[edit on 13-10-2009 by Paroxysm]

It could be a coincidence but maybe it is related to all the earthly events going on that side of the continent, like all the large earthquakes. There have been many complaints from people in your area lately dealing with occurrences not entirely natural or at least not normal.

Maybe this could be related, I imagine a magnetic occurrence could create these kind of noises from this post, might be a pole shift.

AboveTopSecret

It will be interesting to see if a positive cause ever comes out from all of these things, there is a lack of positivity in the world lately.

reply to post by mostlyspoons

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perhaps the polarity shifts of the earth magnetic poles are affecting your work environment?

They are held open by electromagnets. That is ADA required.

So just wanted to say I agreed...

Peace

If the Earth's poles are switching and the polarities are changing, you can also expect the animals of the Earth to begin drifting off their migrational course and the women of the world to begin giving birth to babies with birth defects.