THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 13, 1995 TAG: 9509130451
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY NANCY LEWIS, CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 74 lines
Fire code violations in a Norfolk State University dormitory have been corrected, allowing 208 students displaced by an Aug. 26 fire to return to Scott Hall, university officials said this week.
An alarm system that failed to give warning is operational, though the university will soon install a console fire detection system in Scott Hall and other dormitories, said Curt Maddox, vice president of operations at NSU.
``We are going to make sure that everything is right,'' said Maddox.
Meanwhile, a 24-hour fire watch has been initiated in Scott Hall, a three-story men's dormitory. A total of 18 security guards are positioned strategically throughout the building on rotating assignments 24 hours a day, Maddox said.
And a fire exit door that firefighters apparently mistook to be locked has been replaced.
The Norfolk fire marshal's office concluded that the door was locked from the inside with a key-operated dead bolt after it could not be opened to the outside during the fire.
But state fire inspectors have determined that the door was either ``melted or stuck shut,'' said Janet Bruce, official spokeswoman for the state fire marshal's office.
``On first glance, it could have appeared to have been locked,'' said Bruce.
NSU's Maddox did not attempt to account for a Norfolk fire marshal's report that the building's two other fire exit doors were locked on the night of the fire.
``You can't lock these doors from the inside,'' said Maddox, pushing the panic bar on the new northwest stairwell door Monday.
An alarm sounded as soon as the door swung open. Maddox explained that the key assembly visible on the right side of the panic bar enables authorized personnel to disconnect the alarm system so that the door can be opened without the alarm sounding. The key lock does not bar exit from the building, he said.
But Ed Palaszewski, supervisor inspector for the Norfolk fire marshal's office, said that once firemen had gained exit through the northwest stairwell door by ripping the lock from it Aug. 26, they had to find a security guard to unlock the other two fire doors so that the building could be evacuated.
In his inspection report, Palaszewski ordered NSU officials to ``remove all key operated dead bolts from exit discharge doors in Scott Hall and all other buildings.''
Fire exit doors in all other buildings operate on the same system, said Maddox.
The blaze erupted at about 7:30 p.m. in a pile of foam mattresses temporarily stored in the building's northwest stairwell. Classes began two days later, and students were housed on and off campus with other students and relatives. They returned to Scott Hall Sept. 1.
Palaszewski said two days after the fire that serious code violations had contributed to the spread of flame and smoke and hindered firefighters' efforts to quell the blaze and clear the building. He cited the university for six violations.
Palaszewski said thick smoke from the fire poured into the third-floor corridor and rooms through a wedged-open hall door, trapping some students in their rooms. A few, he said, had to be rescued by firefighters.
The more than 100 students in the dormitory at the time of the fire had no warning as the toxic smoke spread through the building.
State fire marshals took over the investigation three days after the fire, and Palaszewski has since declined official comment, saying that the state alone has jurisdiction over state property.
Ronald Wakeham, director of Norfolk Fire and Paramedical Services, also declined to comment, except to say: ``We have the responsibility for protecting lives, but no authority to inspect or enforce code violations on state property.'' by CNB