Fire in LA bathroom causes evacuation, confusion and multi-day building shutdown

Fire trucks from Hamilton FD arrive at LA building. Photo: Patrick Mulligan
Security Officer Cliff Pollard Leads firefighter into LA building. Photo: Patrick Mulligan
Fire fighters unfurl hoses to extinguish fire in LA building. Photo: Patrick Mulligan

A fire in the second-floor women’s bathroom of the Liberal Arts (LA) building caused an evacuation of several hundred students yesterday, Thursday, November 14. Classes in LA have been canceled and the building closed until at least Monday. No injuries have been reported.

Carmine Cirillo, the Fire Chief at the West Windsor Volunteer Fire Company No. 1, was one of the first at the scene.

*A bathroom fire filled hallways with smoke and several hundred students were evacuated from the Liberal Arts building on Thursday, November 14. Photo: Saad Ahmed*

He said, “It appears it started in the bathroom. We haven’t collected all the information yet. Smoke filled the second floor and there was a lot of smoke damage.”

The Hamilton and West Windsor Police Departments could not provide information but said the investigation is ongoing.

Jim Gardner, Director of Public Relations said that it was “possibly a careless smoker putting a lit cigarette into the trash can.” Other sources suggested there was an electrical fire or toilet paper was set on fire.

*Despite signage, doors to LA building remained open several hours after the fire.*

Chief Cirillo confirmed that the Fire Marshall will have to do an investigation to determine the exact cause.

Alarms went off at approximately 1:50 PM, one of the busiest class time periods of the day. Confused students and faculty proceeded outside and fire trucks from the West Windsor and Hamilton Fire Departments arrived within minutes.

Students and faculty reported that the evacuation process and notifications about the problem were disorganized.

Harathi Peddibhotla, an adjunct professor, said “We saw the smoke actually. We didn’t see any fire. We saw smoke coming out. That’s it.”

One student Joey Dippolito a first-year Business Administration major said, “So, basically I was standing in front of my class. I was doing a presentation, and the alarm went off. We all just, everyone just looked up and we were like ‘What the heck?’”

Students received two MAlerts, one on Thursday evening saying classes were canceled for the day after classes were already over, the other on Friday morning saying classes continued to be canceled, ten minutes before they were set to begin. The second message included a notable typo of “excepted” rather than “expected.”

Students and faculty were not told where to go and some proceeded back inside the first floor of the building from side entrances. Doors to the building remained open as late as 4:20 pm.

Students did not receive information about the situation until five hours later. The first MAlert said classes were canceled for the day even though classes were already over. The second came on Friday morning and said classes continued to be canceled but it was sent ten minutes before they were set to begin.

Jim Gardner indicated there is a multistep process for administration approval before sending an MAlert. There were also ongoing problems with the phone system on campus that may have impeded communication.

Asked for comment about how emergency notification is handled in the case of a technology problem, College President Dr. Jianping Wang, said “We are actually right now, examining [what we do] in the event of an emergency….What do we do if the internet is down?”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article cited an MCCC phone that connected to an inactive mailbox. The phone line was for the municipal website emergency services number, not a MCCC one. Correction was made 5:55pm, Nov. 15, 2019.