By Cassidy Grom | Echo
Third West Wengatz and the center hallway of Sammy II flooded when two fire sprinklers erupted on Tuesday afternoon.
On Third West Wengatz, Josh Granger gripped his military dress uniform in one hand, ready to head to his 12:30 p.m. public speaking class to convince his classmates to join the Marines-then, pop!
The freshman, a reservist in the Marines, turned to face the unfamiliar noise coming from the ceiling of his dorm room.
Black water gushed from the fire sprinkler, covering the walls, the floor and the mattresses, and narrowly missing Granger's persuasive speech prop.
"I immediately started freaking out," he said. "These uniforms are expensive so I . . . threw them out of the room to get them as far away from the water as possible."
Later that same evening, Sammy II PA Matt Schiller, a sophomore, was interrupted from helping a freshman create a four-year plan when a floor member ran down the hall yelling for a PA's help.
Schiller thought the outcry was a joke, until sirens started blaring. He became fully convinced when he saw the water streaming from a hole in the ceiling near the Sammy II lobby.
"My next reaction was to get everyone out of the dorm," he said.
Schiller and PA Davis Wetherell, a senior, herded floor members outside before the two returned to move waterlogged furniture out of the lobby.
During his 33 years at Taylor, Maintenance Supervisor Scott Bragg has only seen three other instances of fire sprinklers malfunctioning-and never two on the same day.
Bragg was on lunch break when he got the call about the damage in Wengatz. Though the water spewed for approximately five minutes before Bragg shut it off, the tide left several inches of standing water in Granger's room and a half-inch in the hallway. Some of the water also seeped down to Second West.
Freshman Joey Ferguson, Granger's roommate, lost his laptop to water damage. Both students' mattresses were ruined.
"I was in shock for a while because I didn't really believe how much water was in there," Ferguson said.
Bragg estimates that eight to twelve rooms were affected in Wengatz. Wednesday morning, red industrial fans dotted the hallway Wednesday and Thursday to dry the carpet.
Bragg was called into action again at 7 p.m. This time he rushed to Sammy where a hood of a student's jacket had caught on the sprinkler head and pulled it off.
Water spewed for about 25 minutes before Bragg arrived. Junior Austin Yoder said rooms surrounding the hallway sprinkler had two and a half inches of standing water by the end of the deluge.
"I lost a computer and some charging cords," Yoder said. "One guy lost some of his subwoofers. It was pretty intense. . . . I still can't wrap my mind around how it went down."
Taylor administration told Yoder that they would reimburse each student with up to $500.
Greg Eley, facilities services director, said the university's insurance policy includes a $10,000 deductible for each event. "I am sure that we are going to exceed that (amount) for the Sammy flood," he said.
Most of that cost will go toward a disaster restoration company, Midwest Remediation. Midwest brought in fans and is continuing to monitor the moisture levels in Sammy. If the levels get too high, there is a risk of mold growing.
Already, Eley is considering removing pieces of mold-prone plaster near the Sammy kitchenette and two strips along the ceiling.
Bragg finds it odd that the two events happened so close together. "I'll tell you this much," he said, "I've been around enough to know these things (sprinkler heads) don't just blow out. There was tomfoolery going on."
Granger maintains that the Wengatz incident was a mechanical malfunction and Schiller said the Sammy event was unintentional.
"It was completely accidental," he said. "There was no prank and it wasn't on purpose."
While those displaced in Sammy moved back in last night, Granger and Ferguson haven't yet been cleared to return to their room.
Residents in both dorms praise the people who quickly assisted in the clean up. Wengatz PAs washed all of Granger and Ferguson's clothes, and Taylor administration, including Skip Trudeau, Steve Morley and Steve Austin, arrived to help the Sammy residents sop up the mess.
"I thought everybody handled it really well for such an insane situation," Yoder said. "It was unfortunate what happened, but it was cool to see Taylor's community step up and help us out."
