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Server Room Smells Can Be an Early Warning
Barence writes "As embarrassing as it may seem, an eggy smell in a server room needn't mean broaching the delicate subject of hygiene with a colleague. It can actually be a signal that something is about to go wrong with your server setup, as this consultant discovered after days of assuming questionable personal habits were to blame. The culprit? An expiring UPS device, sending out its own unique warning signal."
You go get fresh air for a half hour or so, go back in, and see if you smell it again, if this isn't possible, you grab a coworker from a different room. I've never heard of hydrogen sulfide harming server maintenance employees, but it can and does happen in chemistry labs, even at undergrad level. I don't know about sulfur dioxide, but HS is about as poisonous as hydrogen cyanide (zyklon), the difference is only that it stinks so much people tend to flee before it kills them.
It's either false dichotomies, or the terrorists win, you decide.
It effects your mucous membranes. Burning in your nose and throat is a good indicator. Levels of 100 parts per million are immediately dangerous to life and health. Ventilate or have someone hazwoper certified go in with a scba and retrieve the UPS. Short term exposure to "stinky" levels might not have long term effects.
APC UPS's have a tendency to cook their batteries as they get near the end of their lifetime. The results can be horrifying... bulging batteries, and if allowed to go on long enough, yes, even "sealed" lead acid batteries will rupture and you'll get the lovely sulfur smell.
I recently pulled these APC batteries out of an APC Smart-UPS 1400, which had to be disassembled (including the removal/replacement of rivets) in order to get the batteries out.
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