Water in Sullivan House ''wets'' tempers of some on campus

Recent storms in the area have caused problems in house 7. During the heavy rains, the basement has flooded on two separate occasions. Although students living there are assured that they are only isolated incidents, students are inconvenienced by the problems.

BenjaminLunn editorin chief

Anyone who has been in Founder's Hall in the past weeks has noticed the slight musty smell on the bottom floor from the flooding in Founder's. Slightly less wellknown is the flooding that occurred in the basement of house seven, Sullivan House.

The main difference between the flooding in Founder's and the flooding in Sullivan House is what sleeps in the basement. There are two triples in the basements of the house, each of which have been affected by the flooding.

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According to junior Maureen McDevitt, she and her roommates have to keep .a dehumidifier in the room until the musty smell that has been there since they moved in is gone. The smell is just now barely noticeable, so they have moved the dehumidifier into the hall.

Thursday was the second time that the House has flooded this school year. The first time that the basement flooded was at the Leadership Conference during a large rainstorm in late August.

No one was living in the basement at the time. Unfortunately for those that were moving in, the rooms were not ready for them. According to junior Nicole Dickinson, there were parts of the walls in the boiler room that were covered with mud when she moved in. Those residents were not allowed to move in for a few days after the fact. According to Paul Weaver, interim VP of Student Development, the school was "taken completely by surprise."

There were no available beds for the students to stay in for the days that were needed to clean up the mess, and so Weaver resorted to what he considered a standard practice. 'They needed somewhere safe and close to the campus to stay," Weaver said. Weaver opted to put the students up in a local hotel, but only after he checked to make sure that the hotel fit their needs for safety. Even though the hotel was an inconvenience, McDevitt thanks Weaver for his help and assistance.

Aside from the aid of Weaver, McDevitt felt that the school should have at least notified her before she moved in. "'They should have at least called at home;' McDevitt said. All of her belongings that she could not bring with her to the hotel had to go to storage until she was allowed to move in.

Dickinson feels that this should be fixed for the future, to prevent any more inconveniences. According to Public Safety and Weaver, however, these incidents are isolated and occurred solely due to the drought, the slope of the hill that house seven sits on and the sheer volume of the rain.

'The ground was so dry from the drought, and the rain was so hard that the ground just couldn't handle all of it;' said Weaver.