Journalism: Collegian - Fire Alarms
Title: Students ignore alarms at own risk
Author: Mark Freeman
Paper: Collegian - News Section Front Page 9/16/08
Summary: Fire alarms at SMC are a common occurrence. Most students ignore them - but is this a mistake?
Source: Fire alarms original Collegian article



The next time a fire alarm wakes you up at night, do not go back to sleep-get out. It may save your life.

While students may find fire alarms annoying at best, they are the first line of protection against a growing threat.

A 2007 report by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) noted that dorm fires have become more prevalent. "The estimated number of fires in campus housing has risen dramatically in recent years, from a low of 1,800 fires in 1998 to 3,300 fires in 2005. From 2000 through 2005 there were 39 deaths and nearly 400 injuries," the report said.

With this in mind, Michael Viola, assistant director of the Physical Plant, offers one piece of advice: "Evacuate every time. Period."

Viola's advice may seem extreme, considering that most of the campus alarms are triggered due to cooking-related incidents. He noted that students have set off the alarms when cooking bacon or making popcorn.

But the CPSC report explained "cooking equipment causes 72 [percentage] of dorm fires." The CPSC recommended that students cook in designated places only and to never leave cooking equipment unattended. The consequences may be lethal. In 2005, a dorm kitchen fire took the life of Kelly Weimer, a junior at Southern Adventist University in Tennessee.

Saint Mary's College employs smoke detectors and fire alarms all over campus. When an alarm goes off, the building is "dumped," or evacuated. An outside company which monitors the alarms dispatches the fire department to the College and also alerts the Public Safety department.

Viola explained that the fire department comes out every time an alarm goes off. "Fire safety is very important to them and to us," he said. The fire chief decides whether to send a truck all the way to the campus if the alarm is determined to be false. Viola said Saint Mary's keeps in contact with the fire department via radio.

During the fall semester last year, various campus buildings were evacuated 64 times, according to Viola. During this past summer, the buildings were evacuated 29 times, mostly due to accidental alerts set off by contractors.

The CPSC report also recommends that students know their building's evacuation plan in the event of an emergency. Viola said resident advisors (RA) and resident directors (RD) meet with students during the first hall meeting to discuss these safety issues. RAs also receive a fire safety overview in their training and decide their hall's emergency meeting location.

Despite campus policies, many students often ignore the fire alarms. Ben Reed '11 recalled an incident where the fire alarm was viewed more as an inconvenience. "Sometime late in the second semester [of last year] the fire alarm in Mitty hall went off five times," he explained. Reed noted how "very few people evacuated," when the first alarm went off at 10:30 p.m. and then at 2:30 a.m., "no one evacuated."

By the time the fire alarm went off again, Reed "Didn't even get out of bed. I also woke up for just a moment when it went off at 7:30," he said.

"Many times if the RA/RD didn't come and knock on your door, fire alarms would be ignored," Reed added.

While Viola understands that students feel inconvenienced, he explained they are actually breaking the law. "State law mandates that occupants must evacuate the building," he said.

Students who stay in the building may be risking everything. "There really is no such thing as a false alarm. It went off because something happened," Viola said.