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Reading the diverse online police blotters, one must come to the the undeniable conclusion that pot makes you stupid.

Now, getting stupid in your own home is just fine. It when you get stupid outside, that's when you wind up fucking yourself badly.

Here in Boston, for example.

Let's look at the timeline again - I-93N was closed for 60 minutes when they found the first one. They later found a second one at the corner of Stuart Street and Charles St, but no street closures are mentioned. Presumably they thought it wasn't an issue. Ten minutes later, a pipe bomb with a threatening note is found two blocks away at the New England Medical Center. Ten minutes after that, Mooninites are found under two bridges, which are closed. We now know that events were a bunch of unfortunate coincidences, but I can't see how the response was unreasonable because the authorities didn't immediately jump to that conclusion. BTW, it appears those bridges (along with Storrow Drive) were closed for about 30 minutes. That's about the same traffic disruption that would happen for a traffic accident.

So, when and where was that photo taken? Was is the first one under I-93? Or was is one of the later ones when the police knew what is was? Not to mention that even using "just" a ladder requires adequate clearance for safety.

Lugging computer peripherals off a shelf is not in the same ballpark as working a few feet away from a roadway carrying 3,800 cars per hour or an electrified railroad ROW. I've done all three and had 0 near-death experiences working in retail compared with a half-dozen or so working on/near active transportation infrastructure. When you work around roadways and transit lines, you follow the rules or workers (and innocent bystanders) get maimed or killed.

From the BPD timeline: "At 9:00 a.m. The Boston Police Bomb squad is requested by the MBTA to Sullivan Square and examines the item. As a precaution I-93 is closed [...]"

From Wikipedia: "Northbound I-93 reopened to traffic at about 10:05 a.m."

Like I said, it was I-93N was closed for about 60 minutes. That is pretty quick for a highway closure.

Asked and answered.

To determine whether the first device was a bomb, they needed to get up close to it, necessitating the I-93N closure. The Longfellow and BU bridges were closed after the NMC pipe bomb was found. Just because the first device wasn't a bomb, doesn't mean that the subquent devices weren't bombs. Then again, if Turner had put some identifying info on the lights, the authorities could have gotten some clarification.

WTF? How is responding to an unknown object on public infrastructure using caution a poor reaction?

Again, from the timeline: "At 12:54 p.m. the Boston Police Bomb squad receives a call for a suspicious device at the intersection of Stuart and Charles Street. "

"Six minutes later at 1:02 p.m. Boston Police received a call from New England Medical Center Security that they had uncovered a pipe bomb in their building in a desk drawer."

New England Medical Center is about two blocks away from the Stuart/Charles Street intersection - the bomb squad was already in the area.

That assumes that you know what it is, and you know how it's attached. Even if you proceed with the assumption that it's not a bomb, there are other issues that a worker needs to be aware of - for example, is it powered using AC power ( a shock hazzard)? How is it attached to the structure? Is there any identifying information on it that authorizes its placement? Are there any "surprises" like bottles of urine or bags of feces behind it? (you may think that last one was contrived, but I've seen it first hand, and it's something very real that public workers deal with on highways and transit properties).

These are issues that are best addressed by getting a close look. On the other hand, if Mr. Berdovsky had told the authorities on site what he knew instead of staying quiet and video taping it, maybe things could have gone more efficiently.

I don't know where you're getting this '"close the street" for the day' stuff - consult the timeline and the Wikipedia summary. The northbound lanes of I-93 were closed for about an hour. If you've ever been involved in traffic closures (I have lots of times as part of my work), that's pretty damn quick.

I hope you're not basing "closing a single lane" on the footprint of the man-lift - it's not just the footprint, you also need clearance for the radius of the boom (for a bucket truck or cherry picker) or you need adequate clearance for scissor lifts in case they fall over. Of course don't forget adequate clearances for any power or signal lines that might be in the area as part of the Orange line electrification system.

I know it's easy to sit behind your keyboard and second guess these things but I've actually had to work in situations like that. Even in the most benign of circumstances, there are lots of dangers.

If you read the timeline of that day you'll see that the police did determine pretty quickly that is wasn't a bomb. The main issue during the day was that the streets had to be be closed so investigators could safely access the devices - even if the authorities didn't think it was a bomb, the street would still have to be closed to workers could safely remove them. There was also the issue that a real pipe bomb turned up at New England Medical Center during that ordeal.

As I wrote before, the biggest mistake those guys made was hanging the devices off of public property - even before 9/11, doing something like that is just guaranteed to get the bomb squad out there (and contrary to popular opinion, the device that was first called in to the police had only been there for less than 24 hours). Some of the other devices on storefronts though had been there longer.

IMHO the police reaction in this one instance was reasonable - up to the arrest & prosecution part. There were no mass evacuations, no arrests of Middle-eastern people for being Middle-Eastern. They closed the roads, investigated the devices, and reopened the roads. The arrests and press releases after that though were clearly CYA.

On the other hand, the arrest of Star Simpson was a fucking travesty, and my alma mater's response to the incident ("reckless"? WTF? Is wearing a blinking tie to the airport also reckless?) has ended my participation in their alumni fundraising activities.

Interesting, do you have a URL or other reference? Quick google on the keywords in your post didn't turn up a clear result.

Closest I found:
Boston Police Incidents for January 9, 2006
Charlestown Dog Electrocuted

Last night at 18:28 hours a 28-year-old Charlestown resident was walking her 6-year-old dog in the area of Warren and Chelsea Streets when it stepped on a metal grate, fell and died. Animal control responded and took custody of the dog. Boston Public Works were notified, responded and repaired the wires that caused an electric current through the grate.

http://www.bpdnews.com/media/ Most of the way down the page.

What was the voltage and power involved?

Mythbusters did a pretty good job of testing human (dummy) urinating on the "third rail" and seemed to show that electrocution was unlikely. Maybe they could do another segment on dogs and underground high-power lines.