Eight residential halls north of Monroe Street have no underground tornado shelter and the existing plan only provides for students to take shelter in showers regardless of the floor they live on.
Although no building code or regulation requires residential halls to have a basement, tornadoes remain a constant threat to the more than 1,000 students that live there.
Warning and Coordination Meteorologist Rick Smith said the advice given to students is not the safest.
“You want to get as low as you can and put as many walls and barriers between you and the outside,” Smith said. “Without a basement, students should be advised to go into interior hallways and rooms.”
For the past 15 years, students residing in this area have been unable to properly take cover. Students living in the halls said they aren’t sure where to go if a tornado siren goes off.
Matthew Brown, director of housing and residential life, said OSU is revising and updating emergency plans.
“In the future, (the emergency plans) will direct students living in units located on upper floors to move to lower floors when possible,” Brown said. “This would only apply to buildings where students are protected by interior hallways.”
Floyd Cobb, OSU fire marshal, said he is not aware of any requirement to provide basements in the buildings. Booker, Stinchcomb, Zink, Allen, Davis, Bost, Morsani and Smith Hall all are without a basement or legitimate protective area.
“I am not aware of any law in Oklahoma that requires a safe zone to be in buildings to withstand tornado activity,” Cobb said. “Safety comes with a price, and without a law or public outrage, it won’t happen.”
Grace Ingalls, a freshman living in Booker Hall, is from Nevada where tornadoes do not normally occur, but the issue was brought to her attention recently.
“Since we live in suite-like rooms, I assume we fend for ourselves and go undercover within in our individual rooms,” Ingalls said. “No one really knows where to go.”
Cobb recommended going into a bathtub on a lower floor, but, these private four-story residence halls only have glass showers and those on the lower floors are not obligated to open their temporary home to others.
“It would be milk and honey for all dormitories to have basements, but safe areas come with a price tag,” Cobb said. “Without a code, we make the halls as safe as can be.”
Brown said OSU’s new emergency plan pertaining to severe weather will be released in January but includes no regulation for basements.
“Given the number of people living on campus, it is not feasible to have underground shelters for all students,” Brown said. “It would be unsafe to send thousands of students outside to underground shelters during an actual tornado warning. That is too late.”
Nigel Jones, long-range facilities planning architect for OSU, said there is no plan to put in basements or safe zones in the future.
“The residence halls north of Monroe were made with post-tension slab to reinforce and make the foundation more durable,” Jones said. “We cannot cut through that material to put in basements. It is not structurally possible.”
Jones said one option would be to put basements underneath the parking lots, but this has not been discussed.
Until it is, however, students housed in those areas will remain in danger, Smith said.
“There is no absolute guarantee of safety unless there is a basement,” Smith said. “The students have limited options.”
4 comments