Kresge alarms are annoying and dangerous

Kresge alarms are annoying and dangerous

by Mindy Marks

My hair was full of suds as I stood in a sparkling new Kresge shower. As I lathered up, I heard a familiar buzz.

The familiar buzz of gossip? No. The familiar buzz of our static-filled radio? No.

This buzz came from the fire alarm.

I hurriedly rinsed the shampoo out of my hair and hustled to throw on some clothes. As I walked down the hall, I received many sympathetic nods and noticed other women who would also soon have icicle filled hair as we caught pneumonia outside.

Being quite forgiving, I decided to be thankful that there was not a real fire and that everyone was safe. Nevertheless, half an hour later as I attempted to continue my shower, and I again heard that familiar buzz, I was not so forgiving. It was not burnt popcorn, but an alarm malfunction that was causing this problem.

Yet, it was not until Tuesday morning that I realized the full extent of our fire alarm situation. At 3:50 in the morning, I was asleep. At 3:51, I was not. I peeked through my blinds in a sleepy state of confusion trying to figure out where the alarm was coming from.

I groaned as I heard the pitter-patter of concerned residents run downstairs. After hearing a resident assistant pounding on my door, I ventured down from my loft.

As my slippers soaked up water from the puddle I was standing in, I shot evil glares towards the mythical campus structure known as the Kresge. Had this been any other morning, perhaps a singular sympathetic thought might have crossed through my mind. Unfortunately, however, this was the morning before a midterm and I had been up late studying.

Later, during my 9:30 a.m. class, one woman proudly told us that the alarm went off, but she and her roommate stayed in bed. Yes, they did hear their helpful resident assistant pounding on the door, but of course, it would just be another false alarm.

While our alarm system is currently being fixed, it has already caused considerable damage. There are students who could potentially die in a real fire simply because we are too accustomed to weekly surprise fire drills.

Haven’t we learned anything from the story about the little boy who cried wolf?

The more frequently these alarms falsely go off, the more residents will ignore these warnings, and conclusively this situation will become more potentially dangerous.