Apple has been dealing with software bugs for years, but this time one of their stores was hit by real bugs. The bed bugs reportedly hit Apple’s 5th Avenue store located in New York City, leaving employees in a frenzy.
Apple’s 5th Avenue store – why it was closed overnight?
According to a report from the New York Post, Apple’s 5th Avenue store employees have been reporting about the bed bugs for almost a month. As a precaution, the employees also double-bag their stuff.
According to the report, a “bed bug sniffing beagle” came to the store and was “activated” by two staff lockers. As per the University of Minnesota’s College of Food, Agricultural, and Natural Resource Sciences, if there are bed bugs in a retail store its highly possible that one could find them in the locker room.
@Apple @NYCDCA bed bugs at apples 5th Avenue location has employees putting their belongings in bags while they work?! pic.twitter.com/AHeuSji5YS
— Brayden Cohen (@maestrocohen) April 15, 2019
Speaking to the newspaper, one employee said it was “just mayhem” while another said that the employees felt “anxious, used and unimportant, like we were just another number.”
Despite the concern raised by store employees, the issue at Apple’s 5th Avenue store attracted attention only after a bed bug was spotted in a manager’s office. The bug was spotted on the table of the manager after which the table was cordoned off and an exterminator was called.
Later an overnight employee found a bed bug on her sweater. She was quick to take a picture of it and share it with others. As a result, the management was left with no option but to temporarily close the store (which is usually open 365 days a year, 24 hours a day), for about six hours in the middle of the night.
The store, it appears, didn’t inform the employees as to why they were closing. One staff told the Post that the suspense started building when the store that remains open 365 days was shut all of a sudden for a “water leak.”
“There was a mass exodus… employees were freaking out they felt really unsafe and management kept giving them the runaround,” another employee said.
“People came to work and didn’t even know the store was closed, there was no notice,” one worker said.
Staff told the Post that after the last bug sighting, management informed them that the threat is over and “isolated.”
Bed bugs – why employees were concerned?
For some, it would be difficult to understand how a spotlessly clean Apple Store could be infested with bed bugs. Bed bugs, however, do not incline to dirt and grime. Instead, things that attract them are warmth, blood and carbon dioxide. Apple’s 5th Avenue store gets millions of visitors every year, making them a perfect hunting ground for these bugs.
The reason why employees went into a frenzy is because such bugs feed on human blood. Their name comes from their characteristic that they are often found around the bed. Moreover, bed bugs can crawl into your clothes and luggage.
Further, the flat structure of the bugs makes it even more challenging to find them. They can easily hide in the nooks and fissures of the furnishings. According to The Bed Bug Registry, New York City is home to over 4,000 bed bug reports.
How to get rid of bed bugs?
To get rid of them, Susan Jones, a professor of entomology at the Ohio State University’s college of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CFAES) created the Bed Bug Field Guide, which is basically a Bed Bug app.
In an interview with the Pest Control Technology website, Jones said, “The bed bug problem is not going away, so we wanted to create an app to get factual, relevant information into the hands of as many people as possible in an easy-to-use format.”
Jones’ guide includes 15 chapters worth of information on these bugs, including their pictures, how to distinguish them from other bugs, how to eliminate them from your home without damaging your belongings, tips on what to do if you spot such a bug while traveling, how to identify a bed bug bite and how to offer first aid.
Further, the app also informs on how to get rid of bed bugs from public places, including schools and workplaces. The app is available for free on the Google Play Store and the App Store.