Water Floods Science Center

Bluefield College students, faculty and staff were met with a variety of unexpected inconveniences when the Science Center was flooded in January, causing classes to be moved, professors to be displaced from their offices, and damage to some parts of the building.

Members of the BC family were notified about the flooding through a RamAlert issued by Chief Information Officer Chip Lambert on the afternoon of January 22. That afternoon, all power to the Science Center was cut off and the building was evacuated due to the flooding, which was caused by pipe fittings that were not tightened properly by the contractor who installed the HVAC system during the construction of the third floor of the Science Center this past fall.

The water leak began in the HVAC room located directly beside the bathrooms on the new third floor. The water then proceeded to flow down the elevator shaft and into the stairwells. The water eventually reached the lower floors of the building, including a chemistry lab, the second floor break room, and the offices of Dr. Doug Minnix and Dr. Joe Saunders.

“I was teaching the organic chemistry class that afternoon when students heard dripping in the hallway,” Dr. Saunders recalled about the discovery of the flooding. “I came out and saw water gushing out from the closed elevator doors. I foolishly assumed maintenance was pressure washing the elevator shaft — like that ever happens — so I went back and told the class that. Then, it started dripping from the class ceiling, and I knew that (my initial conclusion) was incorrect.”

Regarding his office damage, Dr. Saunders said he saved his computer in time and his work is nearly all saved on OneDrive and class assignments are increasingly in MyBC, so he only lost printed lab safety agreement forms from his organic chemistry students. He said he was relocated to Easley Library for his office hours. There, he said he put together a 1000-piece puzzle and graded assignments.

“My students were perplexed at why I seemed to be happy, smiling with water sprinkling out of the light fixtures,” Dr. Saunders said. “I guess it was the excitement and the craziness of it all.  Praise God no one was seriously injured in this adventure.”

The flooding, he said, did damage carpet in Science 227, so it was removed to avoid mold growth and is still bare plywood. Lambert added that several classrooms and computer labs were also damaged from the flooding, ranging from minimal to substantial damage.

“We had to replace almost all of the ceiling tiles in the chemistry lab, as well as the carpeting in Dr. Minnix’s office,” Lambert said. “The elevator was completely destroyed so we are in the process of getting bids to get it repaired and back up and running. The lyceum suffered some damage, as well, resulting in new carpet tiles being put in. Luckily, no technology or lab equipment was destroyed in the process.”

While not all of the rooms in the Science Center were impacted, the entire building remained closed for six days through January 27, Lambert said, as a safety precaution.

“We closed the entire building and brought in a company from Bristol, VA, to dry the building and perform the cleaning process,” he said. “This ensured that we would not have any future mold problems as a result of the moisture.”

Lambert added that the biggest inconvenience was relocating classes scheduled in the building during the closure time. Ann Looney, director of academic programs, he said, worked around the clock to get all of the classes moved each day.

“I greatly appreciate the flexibility that all of our faculty and students demonstrated during this time,” Lambert said. “It certainly made a terrible situation a lot better. Also, a huge amount of appreciation to Ann Looney for her work on finding new locations for class each day.”

Leslie Flores, a freshman chemistry major, was one of the students affected by the relocation of classes. She said her chemistry labs were canceled and pushed back to a later date, but overall the inconveniences were manageable.

“I’m glad they were able to re-open and fix the Science Center in a timely manner,” Flores said, “and how all the staff and everyone was able to work with moving classes to accommodate the incident that took place.”

The Science Center is currently open and all classes are continuing as they previously were.