Monday, March 12, 2007
Steve Engleman had seen enough. He was ready to take cover.
“It was scary,” Engleman said. “It looked like someone took a zipper and just unzipped it.”
Engleman, a building services employee at the Kansas Union, was on duty the Sunday morning last March when a microburst tore through campus. He and a coworker watched from a window as winds ripped tree limbs and strewn shingles everywhere. He said the experience could be summed up in one word.
“Lucky,” Engleman said. “We’re really lucky nobody was around.”
Only one injury was reported on campus that day, thanks in part to the timely response of the KU Public Safety Office and a warning system that Engleman said worked proficiently in the moments following the storm. Entrance to campus was quickly blocked off, and because it happened in the early morning hours, potential personal damages were kept to a minimum.
Don Steeples, vice provost for scholarly support, agreed that the University was lucky the storm happened so early in the morning, but that steps were in place to make sure the same sort of safety would be offered in a worst-case scenario.
When severe weather threatens the city, Steeples said a “calling tree” was enacted. Officials in the provost’s office call Facilities Operations and the academic deans to communicate a plan of response. The deans call department chairs to notify faculty. The vastness of the 1,000-acre campus presented its own set of obstacles, Steeples said.
“There’s no direct communication into classrooms,” he said. “The assumption is that most people can read the signs.”
Lime green signs throughout campus buildings instruct students to stay indoors, go to the lowest floor of the building, stay in interior hallways and keep away from exterior doors and windows.
Kathleen McCluskey-Fawcett, senior vice provost, said it was impossible to reach out to everyone individually because of the sheer volume of traffic on campus.
“It’s basically a city within a city with the population density,” McCluskey-Fawcett said.
The next step in campus emergency safety, she said, could be a text-message warning system that would automatically alert anyone on campus that bad weather was approaching. Those plans are being discussed but have no timeline for enaction.
pullquote
We want to make sure we’re in the right mindset for whistles and alarms when they go off.
-Pat Beard, director of building services
Campus safety is in the hands of KU Public Safety and the Lawrence Police Department, according to the emergency plan listed on the KU Public Safety office’s Web site. The plan consists of a chain of command from the top down, covering individual buildings as well.
Pat Beard, director of building services for the Kansas Memorial Unions, said his office was part of a standard operating procedure that the University follows in case of emergency. Beard said all Union employees have a list of duties, responsibilities and authorities to follow if an emergency were to arise during busy campus hours. Beard said employees brushed up on their roles at weekly departmental meetings.
“We want to make sure we’re in the right mindset for whistles and alarms when they go off,” Beard said.
Kansan staff writer Erick R. Schmidt can be contacted at eschmidt@kansan.com.
— Edited by Katie Sullivan
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