Students were displaced and sleeping on floors due to an electrical fire and power outage that affected west campus in the early hours of Oct. 2.
Ferris criminal justice sophomore and Bond hall resident Joe Doll compared what he saw the night of the power outage to a refugee camp.
“They opened up Cramer’s lobby for everybody and it was actually kind of terrible,” Doll said. “There were just people laying everywhere like on pool tables, couches and the floor.”
Residents of Bond Hall were evacuated at approximately 3 a.m. on Wednesday morning in response to an electrical fire in the building. Bond, Cramer, Henderson and Puterbaugh halls, as well as the West Campus Community Center and West Campus apartments, all lost power.
Doll recalled hearing stories about other halls having their fire alarms go off due to humidity.
“I just grabbed a jacket and left,” Doll said. “Then I saw fire trucks and police cars and I thought, you know, I probably should have grabbed my pants. I was out there a lot longer than I thought.”
Residents of Bond Hall were told to find another place to stay for the night or until the problem was resolved.
Unlike Doll, Ferris heavy equipment sophomore Cody Witkowski did not find a place to sleep in a neighboring residence hall.
“The cops were walking around after the fire trucks showed up and told us to go find another place to sleep if we could, so I ended up sleeping in my truck,” Witkowski said.
Residents of Bond Hall were let back into the building at approximately 9 a.m. the next morning.
“They couldn’t find the source of what it was, so that’s why they couldn’t let us in,” Witkowski said.
In addition to the electrical fire, all of west campus experienced a power outage.
Ferris pre-optometry Jessica Arnot freshman lives in Puterbaugh Hall and was there during the night of the power outage.
“A bunch of us went down to the lobby and played games and just hung out because there was nothing else to do,” Arnot said. “A guy on the first floor went around with a mask on and was scaring people. He ended up scaring me, but it was still pretty funny.”
According to Ferris’ website, the issue of the power outage was a “high voltage switch gear that includes damaged cables leading to and from the device.”
All classes across campus were canceled until noon on Oct. 2, and all classes in Bishop Hall, allied health, optometry and pharmacy buildings were canceled for the entire day. Some classes were also canceled the next day or moved to another building.
Power was restored to west campus residence halls as well as West Campus Apartments on the evening of Oct. 2.
Thursday night the power was restored to all Ferris buildings on campus, and all classes resumed as normal on Oct. 4.
Puterbaugh is still experiencing troubles with Wi-Fi.
“I don’t think it was Ferris’ fault,” Witkowski said. “They can’t prevent anything like that and I think they dealt with it pretty well.”