By Carolyn Seibert-Drager, Staff Writer, The Slate
When was the last time you thought about what to do if a fire broke out in your home?
If you live on campus at Shippensburg University, you are reminded every month, when residence hall staffs conduct fire drills and health and safety inspections.
If you live off campus, it may have been a while. There likely was a fire drill at your high school during your senior year. As far as what to do if there is a fire, you may have been taught to “stop, drop and roll” or “stay low and go” by firefighters visiting your elementary school during Fire Prevention Week.
Perhaps not surprisingly, the vast majority of fatal fires in the United States involving college students occur off campus. Statistics from the national Center for Campus Fire Safety show that from January 2000 to July of this year, 83 campus-related fires caused a total of 120 student deaths. Of those fires, 70 occurred in off-campus housing, resulting in 101 deaths.
A chart of student fatalities due to campus-related fires and the location of students (Courtesy of Carolyn Seibert-Drager)
Six of the fatal fires since 2000 happened in university towns in Pennsylvania, including at three other Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) schools. In 2007, one student at Clarion University and one at East Stroudsburg University died in fires in off-campus housing. In 2000, three Bloomsburg University students were killed in a fraternity house fire, the second such fire there in six years; five Bloomsburg students died in a fire at another frat house in 1994.
The others were in off-campus housing at Penn State University (one student in 2006) and the University of Pittsburgh (one student each in 2006 and 2000).
Such fires often lead, either directly or indirectly, to changes in local, state or national regulations like building codes, rental housing requirements or university policies, according to Shippensburg Fire Department Chief Randy O’Donnell.
For example, PASSHE mandated the installation of sprinkler systems in all its campus housing after a January 2000 fire in a Seton Hall University freshman dormitory killed three students and injured more than 50 others. The dorm did not have sprinklers.
Pennsylvania building codes have evolved over the years and currently require that “all multi-family dwellings being built now must have sprinklers,” O’Donnell said.
There are smoke detector requirements for such housing as well; each bedroom in a unit or apartment must have a smoke detector, and all detectors in a unit must be interconnected.
Both Shippensburg Borough and Shippensburg Township, where most SU students living off campus reside, have rental property licensing and inspection requirements, as does Southampton Township, Franklin County. Southampton Township, Cumberland County, is considering adoption of such a requirement.
“All those things make a big difference,” O’Donnell said. In addition, many of the newer, larger rental housing developments in the Shippensburg area have staff on premises. “There often is maintenance staff there full time, watching over what goes on and checking for any potential fire or safety issues.”
It is crucial for students living off campus to be alert to problems as well, noted Jamie White, deputy chief of West End Fire and Rescue Co. in Shippensburg.
“The accountability of the occupants in a rental housing unit plays a big role not only in fire prevention, but when a fire occurs,” White said. “If there’s a delay in calling 911, or if someone hears an alarm but is complacent about it and thinks it’s no big deal, it can cause real problems for us.”
A fire in a multi-unit building “requires a lot of firefighters right away to get it under control. We literally have to search every room in the building,” O’Donnell added. “People need to remember that a fire or emergency in their apartment is going to affect every apartment in their building.”