A ban of hanging fabric in dorms has been implemented after a small fire occurred on campus. This new rule is causing a stir from Keene State College students.
A small fire occurred in Owl’s Nest 4 during the week of Halloween. Associate Dean of Students Kent Drake-Deese sent an email to all students and explained that the tapestry, while properly hung, caught on fire and “made a bad situation worse.”
KSC sophomore Krista Mariotti was in the room when the fire occurred. She explained that she was rearranging some furniture in her friend’s room leading up to the fire.
“As soon as I plugged in the fridge, the outlet sparked and there were blue flames,” Mariotti said. She said the sparks flew approximately 36 inches and hit the tapestry hanging on the wall. “I immediately grabbed a water bottle, I thought ‘water puts out fire,’ they teach you that when you’re a kid,” she said. “The fire extinguisher is so far away by the time we would have gotten to it the whole dorm would have been up in flames,” she said. According to Mariotti, the outlet stopped sparking as the tapestry was torn off the wall and no water was thrown onto the electrical outlet, but the smoke detector never went off.
“It all happened so fast,” Mariotti said. She said her and her friend immediately called the resident assistant on duty and campus safety.
Prior to the event, Mariotti said the outlet had always worked. “We had just had health and safety checks so we didn’t think anything of it,” she said.
Mariotti said the campus safety officer instructed the girls to unplug the rest of the plugs in the room because the fuse had blown. “I told him I felt uncomfortable doing that, I was afraid to get shocked,” she said. According to Mariotti, the campus safety officer did not unplug the outlets and immediately called an electrician and the fire department.
Mariotti said she got in contact with the Director of Campus Safety Amanda Guthorn to discuss her concerns regarding the smoke detectors. She said Guthorn told her the smoke detectors are checked every summer.
“I think they should be checked more often than once a year,” Mariotti said.
Guthorn was out of her office and unavailable for comment. Mariotti said she would like to see KSC look into faulty outlets instead of banning hanging fabric. “It wasn’t anyone’s fault, it wasn’t the tapestries fault, this all happened because of a faulty outlet,” she said.
“It’s concerning that the faulty outlet wasn’t seen as a problem during the health and safety checks, it’s not safe, I feel unsafe all the time now,” she said.
According to Drake-Deese, KSC consulted with both the New Hampshire State Fire Marshall and Keene Fire Department and immediately changed the policy on fabric wall hangings.
As of November 13, all tapestries, curtains, quilts, jerseys and all other fabric wall hangings, including those serving as “doors” to closets, have been banned, according to the mass email. Some students are upset about the new rule.
KSC sophomore Tim McGraw said he does not want to remove his American flag from his wall. “I bought my flag on campus, it’s immoral [of KSC] to sell something that you’re going to ban later on,” he said.“I’m just trying to express my freedom.”
KSC sophomore Kyle Sawyer is also frustrated about removing the cloth from his walls. “Living in this dorm room without anything on the walls is a prison,” he said.
First-year student Connor Johnson said he does not like the new rule. “I don’t think everyone should be punished just because this happened in one situation,” he said.
First-year student Katie Bottis said she is disappointed because she wanted to put a tapestry up next year. “It’s an easy decoration,” she said.
“Anything that hangs up can easily catch on fire so it’s pointless the way they are banning them now,” she continued.
The email states that safety is KSC’s number one priority. “The state fire regulations in this matter are clear, inflexible and unavoidable,” Drake-Deese stated in the email.
Though all hanging fabric is now banned from residence halls, the email stated the college is “looking to identify materials that would be acceptable as replacements” to cover the open closets that can be found in many residence halls throughout campus.
MacKenzie can be contacted at mclarke@kscequinox.com