Poly students back after 2nd fire
SLO Tribune 1/11/07
The fire Tuesday night was the second in two days in the same unit at the Stenner Glen student apartment complex.
The fire on Monday night, caused by a smoldering mattress, caused about $20,000 in damage. The room was close to being repaired when the second fire broke out shortly before 9 p.m. Tuesday and destroyed the room.
Fire officials determined that a portable construction light, used that day by a cleaning crew, was left too close to combustible materials and ignited the second fire. It charred the remaining furniture in the room, destroyed the carpet and drywall and spread through the room’s only window to the two apartments above it. Damage was estimated at $50,000.
The San Luis Obispo City Fire Department has ruled both fires accidental.
Students living in the building were asked to seek temporary shelter so that cleanup crews could mop up the waterlogged floors, remove glass shards from shattered windows and rid the building of smoke.
Freshman Elizabeth Goodenough was one of the displaced students. She and four of her suitemates drove to a local hotel at 3 a.m. Her family paid the bill.
The girls struggled Wednesday with exhaustion and juggling their schedules to make sure those friends without cars could make it to their classes. This is the first week of Cal Poly’s winter quarter.
"We just want to feel safe," Goodenough said.
Only two students were unable to return to their apartments Wednesday, but they were offered temporary rooms at the complex, said property manager and co-owner Tim Kershner.
The first-floor room where the fires started was damaged beyond repair, and officials at the complex plan to rebuild it over the summer.
Minor repairs to the rooms above — such as the windows, carpeting and paint — were completed Wednesday.
Students milled about the damaged complex Wednesday, slipping into their rooms to retrieve their belongings.
Kershner said he received numerous calls from concerned students and parents and was impressed by the number of student queries about making sure that smoke detectors are operable.
"If anything positive can come out of something like this," he said, "it is that students are thinking about safety."
Fire officials determined the batteries had been removed from the smoke detector in the room where the fires started.
"Had the battery been in the smoke detector in the room, we wouldn’t have had the fire we had the first night," said John Madden, an investigator with the San Luis Obispo City Fire Department.
The complex houses 625 students. Kershner expects a handful may move out over worries about the fires.
Cal Poly received several calls from students and their parents asking about available housing on campus, but no one officially relocated Wednesday, said Stacia Momburg, a spokeswoman for the university.