the sky was falling.

A heads up call.

It was one of those steamy August days, the kind that makes you seriously consider blowing Air Miles on a family pass to Six Flags Arctic Circle. On a day like this, a second-floor server room with no air conditioning could spell disaster. That is, unless you have someone with a cool head and capable hands on the job. Enter St. Croix Solutions’ Bill Oyler.

The roofing company had damaged the AC unit first thing that morning. While dodging hot tar and gravel raining in through punctures in the HVAC ductwork, Bill watched as the thermometer gradually climbed over 90 degrees. By noon, two mission-critical servers had shut down due to excessive heat. Bill decided enough was enough.

He had an in-house electrician jerry-rig two live AC power circuits to juice up a temporary window AC unit. Because the room didn’t have windows, they mounted the unit on the doorframe and surrounded it with heavy-duty poly cut in slits to permit entry to and from the room.

It worked. The temperature in the server room dipped to 85 degrees while the climate in the adjoining room—the one where Bill would spend the remainder of the day ridding the world of IP address conflicts while sucking down tar fumes—stretched well into the nineties.

That’s our Bill. That’s our motto: Whatever it takes, and then some.