False fire alarms spark concern for students
Awhile back, I learned that if the fire department receives a call from a school and a house at the same time, the fire department will go to the school first because there are more people they have to help save as opposed to a house.
Additionally, when these alarms go off, some students actually get scared and may fear for their lives — though most of the time these alarms are false. With both of these concepts in mind, I must say it is extremely irresponsible to set off these alarms when there is no threat of danger.
Waking up at 3 a.m. to a loud, blaring fire alarm is something I have experienced about three or four times since attending the University of South Dakota.
Although these alarms usually go off Saturday mornings, it doesn’t mean the joke of someone setting off the alarm should become expected.
The first time this happened was alarming, but now they’re starting to get annoying really fast.
On Halloween, I predicted the fire alarm would go off in the morning, and sure enough, I was correct as I walked outside in the freezing cold with my fellow angry dorm mates. It disappointed me that I could so easily predict such an occurrence, and there seems to be a prominent pattern occurring among the people who think it would be hilarious to pull a fire alarm as prank.
The simplest solution to deter this problem might be to install cameras in the dorms to catch the people who pull them as a joke. However, this is somewhat of an invasion of privacy, and it would be nice to know people could just be trusted not to do anything they aren’t supposed to.
There are no situations that constitute as an excuse to pull a fire alarm, unless there is in fact a fire.
While the regularly occurring weekend fire alarm no longer really scares me, the first time was scary because I had no idea what was going on and thought there actually was a fire. There should be major concern when people are no longer affected by the urgency of a blaring fire alarm.
It’s not funny, because essentially people’s safety is possibly at risk.
Suppose the alarms continue to go off and people actually start to ignore them. When there is a real fire, we could have a “Boy Who Cried Wolf” situation on our hands.
As a concerned resident for the well-being of my dorm mates and myself, I certainly hope this kind of childish behavior is put to a stop before an “innocent joke” turns into something devastatingly nightmarish.
