Central Alert system in full use during Dow Science Complex chemical spill

The monthly Central Alert system phone calls finally paid off for a few hundred students with classes Friday in the Dow Science Complex.

The university closed the building because of chemical exposure on the third floor.

The emergency notification system, which has 8,471 registered users, sent out text messages, phone calls and e-mails, as well as alerted students over loudspeakers and sirens across Central Michigan University’s campus.

Three alerts were sent out within two hours.

“I was in a meeting and watched everybody’s phones go off,” said Bruce Roscoe, dean of students. “Everyone was notified. I was impressed how well the phone contact and text messaging went. It was very quick and efficient. By far, it was very effective.”

Students were alerted after a faculty member, whose name has not been released, dropped a beaker filled with about three liters of a liquid base, seeping through the instructor’s shoe. The faculty member was treated and released at Central Michigan Community Hospital on Friday, but the building was closed the rest of the day.

The chemical spill contained a mixture of 80 percent methanol and 20 percent ethylenediamine, a corrosive and flammable chemical.

Rooms 343, 344 and 345 remained closed an additional 24 hours to help rid the partially airborne chemical exposure.

Alert and aware

The first alert was at 10:44 a.m., instructing everyone to stay clear of the building, not to enter and that classes were canceled until further notice.

At 11:21 a.m., the second alert was sent. It instructed students, staff, faculty members and administrators the building was expected to reopen at 1 p.m. and, if any student left something inside of the building, they would be able to retrieve their items at that time.

The final alert was sent at 12:41 p.m., informing users the building would remain closed, and further instructions of personal item retrieval would soon come.

Though no alert was sent letting students know the official time to pick up their items, word of mouth worked in that respect.

Students who have yet to attain their personal items — backpacks, purses, laptops or books — need to contact the department of the class in which they were attending when asked to leave the building, said Steve Smith, director of public relations.

The belongings, he said, were held safely in the building during the weekend.

“If students are in a chemistry class, they need to go to the chemistry department to retrieve their items,” Smith said. “Same goes for physics or biology. If students waited, that’s how they will have to get their stuff, through the department offices.”

Waiting out Dow

Jocelyn Faydenko, a Mount Pleasant freshman, said she did not know much about the emergency notification system until late last semester. Her mother encouraged her to sign up, as she had, to be “in the know” when something happens on campus.

Faydenko was in class in the Dow Science Complex when the chemical spill occurred. She said within 20 minutes of standing outside, she received her first alert on her cell phone. Knowing she would receive more information on when she could come back for her personal items, Faydenko left.

But she found the system misinformed her of when to come back for her items.

“There was some misinformation, I guess, as I was told to come back at the wrong time,” she said. “It was a bit chaotic at the time, but that’s understandable. The good thing is if there’s anything wrong at all — whether it be a bomb threat or a person with a gun on campus — you can get notified quickly and spread the word. That way, everybody’s informed.”