Blameless PIR for the August 8 incident. From 14:02 to 14:47 local time, balloon animal availability at the Hendricks 8th birthday was 0%. 23 attendees affected, plus one parent who asked for a sword. Giggles Gambino was on call and handled comms with professionalism and a kazoo.
Root cause: July's helium consolidation left us with a single point of inflation. The tank's regulator froze during peak demand (the giraffe queue), and there was no failover. I own that decision. I said consolidation was maturity. It was a single tank.
Action items: (1) multi-tank architecture, two tanks in two separate minivans; (2) a public status page; (3) pre-twisted warm-standby poodles at every event; (4) never again use the phrase “one source of truth” about a gas.