When the Sky Fell: A Story of Teamwork, Terror, and Triumph

It started with a rumble, low and distant like an angry drumbeat deep in the chest of the earth.
The sky over our company premises darkened unnaturally fast, clouds swirling like a brewing storm from another world.
I stared at the angry, swollen nimbus, glaring down at us as if to say, "Storm is coming, hide everyone."
For a brief moment, I drifted into fantasy, thinking:
"If this looks bad, how much worse was it during Noah’s flood?"
(According to Bible commentaries, multiply what we were seeing by a million.)
That’s how bad it felt.

Suddenly, with a blinding flash, lightning struck and this time, it was our own signal mast a monstrous blast that split the afternoon in two.
The crackling was deafening. Sparks rained from the sky like molten confetti.
In seconds, our world changed.
Our IT switches fried instantly.
RAMs were rendered useless.
Lights went dead.
The CCTVs went blank, leaving our premises vulnerable.
The servers hummed into silence.
Everything we depended on fell in an instant.
Our mighty signal mast stood there, crooked, injured, like a fallen soldier refusing to surrender.
The entire company's operations ground to a halt not minutes, but hours.
Phones dead. Emails silent. Security blind.
The ship was taking in water and fast.

Panic swept through the campus like wildfire; with everyone we met asking us what we were going to do to restore.
Whispers turned to murmurs; murmurs turned to terror.
Even clients peered anxiously through windows, sensing the silent question in everyone's eyes:
"Is this how we go down?"

But not among us.
Standing there was Njenga, Kamau, Ishmael, and Steve.
We exchanged one look, and that was enough.
We were battered emotionally, but we were not beaten.

Njenga had just joined the team that very same week barely even time to settle and here he was, thrown right into the heart of the storm.
Amidst our frantic plans and rushed troubleshooting, Njenga came in with a huge taste for diagnosing issues, throwing suggestions, highlighting concerns but never once losing his encouraging nature and that constant, powerful push to keep moving forward.
His presence, fresh as it was, sparked an extra fire in us.
Without a word, the unspoken bond we had been building on football fields and over lunch tables lit up between us.
We had to fix this. Together.



The Fight to Restore

We grabbed what we could tools, ropes, spanners and armed ourselves with hope reinforced by Ephesians 6.
Ishmael, swift like a mountain goat, led the assault on the broken mast, clambering up through tangles of burnt wiring and soaked steel.
Kamau, calm and commanding, coordinated from the ground like a battle-hardened field general, barking orders sometimes drowned out by the rain — but his steady hand kept us focused.
Ishmael, the technical wizard, squeezed into the ceiling boards,
Navigating through dark, cramped spaces, Wringled wires and decades of dust wriggling past natural beehives (yes, real ones), he emerged now and then covered in a tomb of time, a silent archive of forgotten centuries, a stillness undisturbed, woven into a tapestry of dust and cobwebs, looking like he had just traveled through deserts from the distant ages.
One client gasped:
"Is that a maintenance guy or an ancient explorer?" not knowing that he was taking one for the team.
We didn’t have time to laugh but later, oh, we did.

Steve, strong and stubborn as an ox, scaled rooftops with heavy switches strapped to his back, balancing dangerously close to the edge like an action movie star except there were no stunt doubles here.
At one point, he swung from one beam to another, shouting:
"If I fall, tell my mother I died doing what I love!"
It would have been hilarious if it wasn’t so terrifying.
Mr. Amugune always walked away so as not to imagine what could happen if he slipped.

The rain drizzled, the roofs were slippery, and the ceiling boards creaked ominously under our weight.
We slipped, we hoped, we prayed, we laughed.
We got back up.
Every pull of a cable, every switch replaced, every slippery climb was a declaration: we will not sink.

Njenga, despite being the newest soldier among us, jumped right into the fray, climbing, pulling cables, sketching backup plans, and throwing words of encouragement when exhaustion bit hardest.
His fresh energy, fierce insight, and unwavering spirit became a critical pillar to lean on when the going seemed impossible.


Turning the Tide

After days and hours of backbreaking, heart-pounding work —
A light flickered.
Faint, then stronger.
Then another.
CCTV monitors blinked to life, one after the other.
Phones buzzed.
Emails chimed.
Servers hummed back to life.
The Fans roared back to life.

We had done it.
The ship was floating again.

From inside the building, a roar of cheers erupted. Staff clapped.
Even clients smiled and gave thumbs-up through the glass as the staff dove into the net for research and transformation.

We looked at each other muddy, bruised, soaked to the bone and smiled that quiet, battered, victorious smile that only survivors know.


The Lesson Learned

Later that day, as we sat on the curb outside, steaming mugs of tea in our hands, legs dangling in exhaustion,
we realized something:
It wasn’t just switches and lights we restored.
The whole company had been watching.
Watching how we moved.
How we trusted each other.
How we refused to panic.

A senior manager was heard saying, voice soft and serious:
"Today, they didn’t just fix systems. They showed everyone what real teamwork looks like."
And it was true.

Since that day, teamwork wasn’t just a value printed on posters.
It was alive — born under fire, nurtured in chaos, and sealed with grit.


Moral of the Story:

- True teams are not tested by sunny days, but by raging storms.
- Skill restores systems, but heart restores hope.
- Even when the ship is sinking, if you lock arms and move together, you will float and you will rise.



Written by:
Ismael K. Ngeno,
System’s Developer and Trainer,
Busara Medical Training College, Nyahururu, Kenya.