[MSN] National Library hit by flooding. Curators at the National Library of Scotland say there was no major damage to any of their collections following a flood late last night. The incident happened when the sprinkler system was damaged during refurbishment wo

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National Library hit by flooding 

Curators at the National Library of Scotland say there was no major damage
to any of their collections following a flood late last night. The incident
happened when the sprinkler system was damaged during refurbishment work.   

The National Library of Scotland is a treasure trove of information. Many of
the documents stored there are of huge historical importance, like a letter
written by Mary Queen of Scots six hours before her execution.   

In June it became home to the John Murray Archive - an exhibition of more
than 150,000 manuscripts and letters by the likes of Sir Walter Scott and
David Livingstone.     
National Library 


There were fears that many irreplaceable documents may have been soaked when
the building flooded last night after the sprinkler system was damaged
during refurbishment work. But fortunately that was not the case.   

Cate Newton from the National Library of Scotland said: "The vast majority
of the collections are completely unscathed, a very small percentage of the
items did suffer some water damage but they very largely protected by the
specialist boxes we keep them in. They'll now be dried out over a period of
time at a conservations unit."  

The sprinkler system, which blasts out 26 gallons a minute, was installed
exactly ten years   
Items in the John Murray archive 
ago. At the time, the library's public services director explained why they
would prefer documents got wet rather than burnt.

Speaking in August 1997, Dr Alan Marchbank said:  "I was always brought up
to believe that you kept water away from books because it brought them back
to the pulp they came from but what we're really saying is if we've got wet
books we've got techniques to deal with that, we can't cope with a whole
pile of ashes."  

Meanwhile, the refurbishment work means the exhibitions and reading rooms at
the library will be closed for the next fortnight.

http://www.stv.tv/