Katie Evans, a sophomore public health major, was sitting in her bed watching TV in McCoy's suite 102 when her suitemate urgently called out her name.
When she opened the door, she saw that the common kitchen area and hallway were flooded. There was a faint smell of smoke in the air.
The audible alarm started ringing at approximately 4:45 p.m., 45 minutes after Evans reportedly saw the smoke in her hall, on Wednesday, Jan. 21. The sprinklers went off as soon as heat and smoke were detected and extinguished the fire.
The delay in the audible fire alarm system was due to a malfunction in a system microchip. The Housing Office, the Campus Safety and Security and the Baltimore City Fire Department could not give any explanations as to why the audible alarm went off later.
Evans was confused when she was confronted with a sprinkler system downpour.
"I went outside and literally saw a waterfall falling from the ceiling," Evans said. "I could smell smoke, but I did not know if it was coming from the inside or the outside. People assumed there was a a problem with the pipeline and called the Housing Office."
"Later the alarm sounded. We did not know if it was a drill or an actual fire," Evans said.
The fire department determined the cause of the fire to be a malfunction in a cell phone charger left plugged in the power strip in suite 201. The cell phone charger was melted to the power strip.
According to Tracey Angel, director of Housing and Conference Services, the power strip was approved by Underwriters Laboratories, a product safety testing and certification firm.
"The fire ignited from the cell phone charger spread to the carpet area, chair and the desk," Angel said.
"Fortunately, the student was not in the room when the fire started. The smoke detector and sprinkler immediately extinguished the fire, but the sprinkler system affected the rooms downstairs."
The smoke detector set off sprinklers in three second floor suites, affecting the rooms below and those on the terrace level.
"The fire panel is checked each day and the alarm operating systems are checked four times per year," Angel said.
"The McCoy alarm system was checked by FireLine one week before the fire, and this system, including the microchip, was fine.
"[The alarm malfunction] was likely a computer problem that no one could anticipate."
The next day, the Housing Office sent letters to the 32 students in the nine damaged suites explaining the cause of fire and the flooding.
The affected suites were closed and students' personal belonging were gathered in bags.
The Housing Office provided conference linen and escorts to retrieve important possessions for the students' temporary stay.
Campus Security formed a fire watch with extra security officers to monitor McCoy 24 hours a day. Signs were put up around McCoy asking students to be extra vigilant.
"The drying of water was done by Monday and the students in the flooded suites will be able to return this Friday," Evans said. "The suite where the fire started needs more time for repair and construction."
While the Housing Office did the best they could to provide the students with temporary stay, there was some confusion during the process.
"They were very quick to give us rooms to stay, but they were late in notifying the people what happened," sophomore Melody Nath, a resident in one of the affected suites, said.
"Housing also did not notify the some students whose rooms the affected people moved in to so there was some confusion there too."
The students living in McCoy had different views concerning the fire and the delay of the fire alarm.
While some students were shocked at the malfunction, other students were not even aware of the delay.
Others had heard the news about the delay of the fire alarm later, but were not concerned because of a disconnect in communication.
"The hallway was flooded. We called the maintenance, but they did not know what was happening. Thirty minutes later the alarm rang," Jennifer Whitehead, a sophomore neuroscience major, said.
Her reaction, however, was different after she heard what had caused the fire.
"The RA told us later in the evening what had happened and I flipped out."
Other students reacted differently to the fire alarm, mostly because they were not sure how to treat the incident.
"I wasn't really concerned. The fire had been extinguished already when the alarm rang," sophomore Baoluo Sun, also a McCoy resident, said.
"I thought it was just another fire drill."
