The evacuations of three buildings on campus last Tuesday, while unfortunate for the students and faculty involved, were handled with the highest standards by campus officials and the New Britain Fire Department, considering the chaos and large workload that occurred within a short period, and the mess that could have occurred without such timely responses.
After a fire broke out in James hall, roughly 400 students needed to leave for their own safety and were not allowed back in until the following morning. With the residence hall being closed the rest of the day and night, CCSU officials needed to react quickly, and they did. Dr. Laura Tordenti, vice president of student affairs, spoke to the student government last Wednesday, saying she was impressed with the help that the Red Cross and homeland security provided to the school, assisting CCSU officials with the fast creation of a home inside Kaiser Hall for the students that lived too far away from their homes and needed a place to sleep that night. Tordenti said it was comforting to her, and others, to know that such a timely response could be had. And it should be comforting to students and faculty as well that a response like that is out there should a true tragedy strike this campus.
It was impressive to see the school bring in a professional cleaning crew later in the day so that they could have the hall reopened to students the next day. The fact that the residence hall indeed opened at their estimated time is even more impressive, as it would have been easy to miss their projected mark with even one lapse in judgment or decision making.
The evacuation of the student center posed a different threat, after two students reported feeling ill and lightheaded. While it turned out to be pure coincidence that the students felt ill hours after the smokey fire in James hall, it was still a great precautionary tactic to have the NBFD and state officials on hand so fast to test the air quality of the building. It returned a sense of calm to those who may have been afraid to walk through the building, a needed stabilizer after the morning’s event. Students surely know situations like this rarely happen on the CCSU campus, so when two or three pile on top of each other, it can be a bit overwhelming.
Even though the evacuation of the library due to pepper spray being sent into the air seemed like a small matter, the NBFD’s third visit to campus was indicative of the day’s timely theme. Officials once again responded fast, and the fire department was able to rid the library of the lingering odor by bringing in large fans to air out the building.
Getting students in and out of the library within approximately a half hour was and impressive amount of time to wrap up such a situation. Rapidly removing the spray allowed students to not be delayed too much in their studies and go back to what they were doing. It also allowed the campus to return back to its regularly scheduled routine.
Not much was good about what happened on the CCSU campus last Tuesday. It’s a day that will remembered, but thankfully mostly for the great response CCSU showed. The news reports on the local television stations could have been in a different light that night. Thanks to the timely response of CCSU officials, the school came off in a positive light, as it should. It’s just troubling that such events had to occur in a matter of one day.