Monday, August 4, 2008
It was a spring day on campus and Pat, who prefers to remain anonymous, just bombed an accounting test. In moments of great desperation such a this, Lawrence used to offer a little piece of heaven known as The Crossing.
Pitchers of beer and an enticing front porch greeted guests and helped to comb over problems of the day.
Pat decided to cool off from his accounting test with a cold brew.
However, it was midday on campus and all the partygoers were locked in classrooms. Class or no class, Pat wasn’t going to drink alone.
His friend was in the middle of a lecture at Wescoe Hall when he texted him his master plan.
Pat walked through the lower floors of the building, found a fire alarm, pulled on the handle and walked calmly away. But it was his first time in the building and he had trouble finding his way out.
“I kept trying to leave but it took me a while to find an exit,” he said.
As the sirens went off, Pat took a seat outside Strong Hall and patiently waited for his friend to arrive.
“When the fire trucks got there we decided to head out,” Pat said.
Pulling the fire alarm has become a popular prank on college campuses. False alarms in residence halls wake students at all hours of the night and force them to sit outside while no fire is found.
Diana Robertson, director of student housing, said fire alarm pranks could usually be linked to frequent pullers. In the past, a student who has pulled the alarm once will usually do it again. In her years as director, she has seen the frequency of false alarms fluctuate.
“It’s an annoying prank,” Robertson said. “Usually students will report whoever is pulling the alarm because they get tired of it.”
According to Robertson, false fire alarms are usually set off by someone’s cooking catastrophes or faulty alarms. Prank alarms are low but carry heavy consequences.
Students sometimes get lulled by false alarms and find a way not to evacuate, Robertson said. Unfortunately, when there is a real fire, the students who remain in the building could risk their lives.
If an alarm is pulled, the office of student housing and police work together in order to prosecute offenders to the fullest extent of the law.
The department of student housing holds educational meetings about fire safety every year. The meetings emphasize the importance of responding to alarms in a routine pattern for student’s safety.
Rich Barr, division chief with Lawrence Fire and Medical, assists with the educational meeting every fall. He said there had been years where the fire department had responded to upwards of 80 residence hall calls. He said most alarms were pulled during midterms and finals.
“We want students to understand that it may be fun to hear sirens and upset friends, but that someone could be harmed,” Barr said. “It takes 1 of 900 residents to upset a building.”
Although false alarms on campus do happen, by far the most false alarms are from the residence halls. Barr said Oliver, McCollum and Naismith halls had alarms pulled most often.
This college prank carries legal consequences as well. In Kansas, giving a false alarm is a class A misdemeanor. For a get-out-of-a-test-free card, offenders could land themselves in jail for up to a year. It could also cost offenders with fines going up to $2,500.
Pat and his friend left without so much as a question.
The next day he picked up the campus paper, while reading the free for all, one entry in particular caught his attention.
“For whoever pulled the fire alarm in Wescoe yesterday, thanks,” the entry read.
— Edited by Matt Hirschfeld
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