Refrigerator Fire Elicits Massive Response at Life Sciences
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By George Agathos
According to Little, there was a smoke condition. He said, "The campus police received the call and then immediately contacted the fire department and Environmental Safety." Authorities are taking "every precaution" because the fire was in a research building. Firefighters involved in the call were treated as if they were exposed to hazardous chemicals and were decontaminated. Fire trucks came from several local districts, including Port Jefferson, Setauket, Centereach, and Selden. The Suffolk County Hazardous Materials team also responded to the call. A fifth-floor window on the North side of the building was broken by rescuers to provide ventilation. Dr. William Lennarz, who was in the building when it was evacuated, said that the building was emptied quickly. "They got us out of there. And they kept us out." Many were not lost on the irony of the situation either- today was campus fire prevention day. The local fire marshall gave a presentation at Mendelsohn quad earlier in the day. No injuries have been associated with the incident.
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After speaking with a graduate student who works on the floor where the fire occured, it was explained to me that the refridgerator catching fire was only circumstantial. Apparently, old chemicals kept in too close of proximity in a fume hood were the culprits in the origin of the fire. These chemicals were originally intended to be disposed of, but unwittingly they were left in a fume hood.
The effects of the smoke may have altered some peoples experiments, the graduate student said. Tightly controlled environmental conditions are paramount in most experiments conducted in the building, and some were on the same floor of the fire being subjected to the resulting smoke. Freak accidents like this have reeked havoc on experiments in the Life Science building before. When the Northeastern Blackout of 2003 occured many biological samples kept at frigid temperatures were lost. The graduate student hopes that the smoke poses no real problem as it could set back his experiment once again.
That is entirely possible. It was one of the many stories floating around that day. However, the article contains what the official word on the fire was at the time. This could very well be wrong.
If it is, the statesman has the wrong story as well, and so does chief Little, because this was repeated in the Statesman's belated article (http://sbstatesman.org/news/2005/10/03/fire_in_life_sciences)
Nice pictures.