h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This was on the first w*rk day in January one year, just after the New Year celebrations.

I worked in the accounts department of a hotel, and our office was downstairs, one floor below street level - and we had a lot of work ahead of us, closing the books for not only December, but also for the whole year.

The three of us arrived at the same time, and took the lift down, unlocked the door, turned on the light - and discovered that the entire floor of our rather large office was covered by thick, dark brown mud!

It had been an unusually cold New Year's Day, with the temperature dropping to somewhere just below -30 C (-22 F) and the plumbing under the street outside of the hotel had frozen and cracked, and leaked vast amounts of water - which had then leaked into our underground office - and I don't know if it was fresh water mixed with earth, or sewer water - it looked and smelled dreadful!

Well, we had to close the office for a couple of days while it was cleared and aired - and told our head office they had to wait for the closing of the books of our hotel due to - yep - 'force majeure'