All day Tuesday, the Oakland Police Department's headquarters on Seventh Street in downtown Oakland were closed to the public due to severe flooding from an overflowing toilet on the third floor.

An employee "discovered" the overflowing toilet while working in the records section of the nine-floor building at 3 a.m. Tuesday morning. The flooding was so bad the second and third floors of the building were covered in up to an inch of toilet water. The flooding seeped down to the lobby, causing officials to close the building to the public all day Tuesday.

Oakland PD officials attempted to open the building Wednesday morning, but quickly evacuated again when people started to complain about "lingering odor and eye irritation." A restoration company was on hand to try and sop up the mess and repair water damage, but Oaklanders looking for official paper copies of crime reports are temporarily out of luck.

Local journalist George Kelly was on the scene yesterday to bring us a report:

This isn't the first time Oakland PD HQ became sodden: In 2007 a water main broke on the sixth floor, forcing some police units to relocate for months. Which is to say that all of this would make for a good side plot on the set of a ripped-from-the-headlines police procedural drama.

[CBS5]
[Oakland Tribune]