Students living in Anderson, Centennial and Letts were evacuated to Mary Graydon Center after a fire alarm went off in the Southside residence halls Oct. 29 as Hurricane Sandy rained down on the campus.
The cause of the fire alarm is not known at the time.
Some students speculated it may be due to a student cooking in a lounge, according to student Andrew Lowery, who believes the source comes from his lounge.
Students on the south side of the fifth floor of Letts believe the source of the fire alarms started in their lounge, said Lowery, a freshman in Kogod, who lives on the fifth floor.
An individual cooked pasta earlier in the day, and some pasta had fallen into the stove burner, fifth floor resident Alec Hutkoff, a freshman in School of International Service, said.
When a fifth floor resident cooked eggs tonight, the fallen pasta caught on fire and caused the stove to smoke, according to Hutkoff.
Hutkoff said he saw two Department of Public Safety officers examining the stove during the fire alarm.
Anderson Hall Resident Director Lindsay Butterfield declined to comment in time of publication.
Students spent about 15 minutes in MGC before being told to go back to the dorms.
Once students arrived back at Southside, students were required to show their IDs to the Housing and Dining student staff at the doors.
Nick Allmaier, a freshman in School of Public Affairs who evacuated Anderson, thought the fire alarm was kind of dangerous due to hurricane conditions, but also “silly.”
“Well, that was my shower for the night,” he said.
However, some students were more upset with having to evacuate during the hurricane.
“It was a false alarm,” Airi Nagafuji, a sophomore in SIS, said, “so I thought it was meaningless.”
hmongilio@theeagleonline.com
