Mayhem breaks out along the Berkshire Mountains, in the streets of Belchertown and throughout the halls of UMass Amherst this Halloween weekend.The slippery slopes and snowy terrains made it very difficult for UMass students to travel outside the dorms Saturday evening to enjoy the holiday. Many found themselves safe and warm in the residential halls over the weekend while several off-campus students are still without power.
Sophomore Catherine Kelly managed to stay dry and warm in MacKimmie hall Saturday night, and explains how the weekend went for her. “My weekend was not that interesting,” says Kelly.
Between studying for exams and finding parties that weren’t already broken up by the police, Halloween could have gone a lot smoother for many UMass students. She says, “It was okay, the best part was seeing my friends from home but the snow and loss of power ruined my Saturday."
However before the storm, Kelly found herself waiting outside the Studio Arts Building bus stop dressed as a rocker-chick along with many other inspired costumes.
Kelly diligently stared at two girls with plastic shark hats covering themselves from head to shoulders, with blue shirts that read the days of the week.
After about a minute or so, she came to realize the two girls were dressed as shark-week, a Discovery Channel favorite where for one week in the summer the channel airs programs solely dedicated to sharks. “It was easily the most creative costume I’ve seen in a while,” says Kelly.
At most college campuses, the trend seems to be for Halloween to last three nights or more of crazy parties. Students such as Kelly were hoping for Saturday night to be the best of the three, but were brought down by patrolling Residential Assistants in the halls rather than police officers on the street.
Kelly claims she knows of at least thirty students that were written up on the second floor of MacKimmie hall for loud noise and alcohol consumption in the rooms. She says, “I found it really unfair for the R.A’s to be cracking down so hard on us when they know we have nowhere else to go during the storm. Come on.”
“Staying in the dorms was our best bet of staying safe, but not the way I planned on spending my Halloween,” says Kelly. “I was so bummed because I wanted to see more costumes! That’s the best part.”
Kelly’s Halloween weekend was not the only one with a dimmer; several off-campus students were more concerned with getting their electricity and heat back in motion than finding the best Halloween ragers.
Jessica Thompson, a UMass ‘super-senior’ lives in Squire Village, about two miles away from campus. When asked how her Halloween was, she responded, “Cold. I haven’t had any hot water, heat or power of any kind. I spent my Halloween at my parents’ place in South Hampton, where luckily they have a generator.”
Thompson just had her first shower in three days. “I walked into the ‘rec-center’ praying for hot water,” she says. For food, she has mainly been eating out but has had too many peanut sandwiches to count.
Most off-campus students have found it easier to just go home for the week until they can resume their electricity. Of Thompson’s three roommates, two went home and one stayed back with Thompson to tag along in front of her parents’ warm fireplace drinking hot chocolate.
For several days now, firefighters have been knocking on the doors of Squire Village, explaining to the residents what exactly is going on and where they can go for shelter.
Firefighter, paramedic and staff member of the environmental health and safety on campus, John Hawley of Belchertown describes how the storm has been seen through his eyes. Hawley’s first words were, “It’s been a very interesting weekend.”
On his way home from Boston, Mass., Hawley entered a rude awakening when he arrived on campus Sunday morning at 8 a.m. to find the UMass campus out of power.
He says, “I haven’t been able to get home since Saturday. Trees are blocking every road I need to get there.” Belchertown is said to be out of power until about November fourth or fifth. Hawley has been working and staying on campus all weekend and early into this week.
Hawley’s main focus has been dealing with the power outages and fire alarm systems on campus. At 2 a.m Tuesday morning, laughs were on the Southwest towers when five fire alarms were pulled. “Pranks are the last thing I need during this time,” says Hawley. “But you can’t fix stupid.”
Behind the Mullins Center, a central heating plant was put in to generate power throughout the campus. Hawley describes that if this generator were not installed two years ago, all students would have to be brought into shelters, and classes would have been prolonged a lot longer.
On UMass grounds alone, there are two shelters available with 300 cots per shelter. Over the course of two days all 300 of those cots have been emptied. Hawley says, “260 of those cots have been brought to Chicopee High School, South Hadley, Monson and Belchertown.
He mentions that over the TV yesterday morning, he heard that National Grid has 750,000 homes out of power in the state of Massachusetts.
Reasons as to why the snow is much worse out in Western Mass. than in Eastern is due to the un-fallen foliage. Because the leaves are still on the thousands of trees in this Berkshire area, that when snow comes down they remain on the leaves, making the trees heavier, thus falling into the roads. Hawley has seen several trees being removed off of cars around campus.
For him, there hasn’t been too much trick or treating or Halloween fun over this grueling long weekend. Hopefully, the power for surrounding cities will come back earlier than expected, and students will stop pulling fire alarms in the largest residential buildings possible.
No comments:
Post a Comment