Wind theory

Last night I went to bed at around 9:30pm, but couldn’t sleep cause it was so windy – wind howling through the roof. I must have eventually fallen asleep (last saw the clock say 10:40pm) though. I awoke at 1am thanks to the storm – lots of lightning, thunder, etc. I walked out of my bedroom to check the open (but secured with screens) windows in my office in case the rain was coming in. Checked the BOM website for a rain radar map, then went back into my bedroom to go back to sleep. This was all in the dark, didn’t need to turn any lights on, can find my way around ok. I noticed that as I closed my bedroom door, the sound of rain on the tin roof above me was very… tinny. Normally it’s muffled by the insulation and plasterboard between me, and the roof. I looked up – it was coming from above the bedroom door – where the manhole (personhole?) is. I turned the bedroom light on. The manhole was open!!
Faarrk, scary!! I got a knife, LED torch and my mobile… then checked inside all cupboards and doors, under the bed, etc. The ceiling is high (9 foot), so I got a broom and used it to reach up and close the manhole cover. It was fairly light (just a square piece of plasterboard), but a good 3 inches from its resting place up over the pine-wood bracket so that it could be slid aside… i.e. gravity holds it down in place, it needs to be lifted up 3″ over the pine bracings, before it can be slid across.
So how did it move by itself? Maybe the wind did it – that’s my only explanation… either that, or there is / was someone in my roof. Whilst my bedroom door and window were shut until I got up at 1am to check my office (at which time I only opened my bedroom door), I think that when I *left* my bedroom to go to the office, the manhole was closed… I’m pretty sure I would have heard the wind (or someone), open the manhole if I was sleeping in a fairly quiet room, 2m from the manhole – which is on the inside of my bedroom door.
On a normal breezy day, a draft is often created through the house – from the living room sliding doors, through and out my bedroom window. The living room sliding doors were open but the security screens were locked – it was a very windy night. I would prefer to think it was wind, not a person or animal that opened my manhole cover. My only scientific theory is that with the wind blowing quite strongly from the front of the house to the back through the roof where the gutter is, me having opened my bedroom door caused a large amount of air to come in through its’ usual draft via the living room to my bedroom, but with my bedroom window closed, the draft being forced to escape via the manhole – the only ‘escape point’, hence dislodging the cover.
Here’s a diagram of my theory. If anyone out there has the scientific knowledge to back it up, or prove me wrong / right, that would be nice…

Thanks to the above, it took me forever to get to sleep. I had the weirdest dream too – rats started jumping out of the open manhole and I was stabbing them with my knife. In my dream – I went to a party the day after, where I saw my neighbours from about 6 yrs ago (Trish and her daughter Kim)… and they were trying to find all their pet rats that had escaped. Bloody weird dream. But it isn’t as weird as the one I had a few weeks ago – in this other dream, I walked into my bedroom to see about 7 hermit crabs, all with dome-shaped jelly-fish like shells, every one a different bright colour, spinning around on the carpet. Spinning fast for about 30 seconds, then stopping and spinning the other way. For those really concerned right about now, no – I don’t do drugs. It was the weirdest dream ever! But yeah, it was weirder than the rats that came out of the manhole in my dream last night.

Anyway, back to my story. I know I didn’t dream the manhole thing because 1) the broom I’d used to push the manhole cover back into place at 1am this morning was still next to my bed where I’d left it. 2) The knife, torch and mobile phone were also next to me where I’d left it. 3) I’d SMS’d Brandt when it happened, and I can see the message in my sent-items on my PDA. So I didn’t dream that the manhole had opened, the only bit I dreamed was the rats coming out after, thanks to my brain using the whole manhole-thing in my next dream.
Today after work, I rigged up my wireless night vision camera to the end of the broom handle and poked it up for a look. I recorded the result, all looked okay. But hey, if you were a person hiding in a roof, you’d move around so that the camera was always facing away from you (i.e. with your body behind the camera)… I needed to look for myself. So I hauled a DJ speaker over, and stood on it. Hrm, I need light. So I rigged up 5 power boards (couldn’t find an extension cord) to reach the nearest power socket, turned my 2000-watt club strobe on MAX speed, lifted it into the roof and turned it on.

Hoping if it were an animal, it’d be dead by now from the uber-rapid strobe flashing, I stood on the speaker again about 1 minute later and poked my head into the roof… nothing – just insulation rolls and cables and stuff. I noticed too, that each unit has its own roof – in other words, there’s no way to enter one units’ manhole, and come out of another. Hrm, no one in the roof. So I think it was the wind. Well, that’s what I’m telling myself anyway.

The Wind Theory (Pro’s)
• It was a very windy night
• I believe it happened soon after I opened my bedroom door
• It’s almost impossible to open the manhole from inside the roof, given the clearance between the pine wood frame
• I would have heard someone jump down into my room from inside the roof – I was sleeping 2m from the manhole, in the same room
• Once in the roof, where could you go? It’s tin – no tiles, no way to get into other units – the only way in or out is via the manhole
• If someone left my room via the roof, how did they climb up? No furniture was moved, and even if it was – how would they move it back into place once they were in the roof?
• Even if I stand on a 1m tall speaker, my head can only just see inside the manhole into the roof – and I’m 187cm tall. Without a ladder, no one could have hauled themself up into the roof.

The Wind Theory (Con’s)
• Can wind lift a square piece of plasterboard against gravity?
• It wasn’t howling with wind at the time (1am) – but it was earlier in the night at 10pm.
• The storm would have made it noisy – maybe I didn’t hear someone jump down.

Needless to say, both of my wireless night vision cameras are going to be setup tonight and the motion-detection software activated… just in case All files captured are going to be stored offsite on a remote web server, in case something happens to my PC.
Right now, ANY noise is making me jump – even stuff in the music I’m listening to :S It’s moments like these you wish you had someone to snuggle with.
Wish me luck, and hope that it doesn’t happen tonight and that “it was just the wind”…