Unnecessary evacuations cause panic

Pulling a false fire alarm is a Class B misdemeanor.

By Rachel Allred

Published Oct. 2, 2009

Pulling a fire alarm when there is no real emergency is considered a Class B misdemeanor and legal action is taken against those who violate alarms.

Assistant Fire Marshal Debbie Sorrell said if a fire is falsely reported, measures are taken to find the person. She also said alarms pulled as pranks are taken seriously.

"Evacuations can be dangerous," Sorrell said. "Panic's not pretty."

Sorrell referred to the Missouri Criminal Code, which describes a false report as when a person knowingly makes a false claim of a fire or other incident that requires an emergency response.

Security cameras, eyewitness accounts and special dye can be used to find the perpetrator, Sorrell said. The dye, which is placed on various alarms, rubs off onto the hand once the alarm is pulled and does not wash off for a couple days.

Last year, 73 malicious false alarms were reported in Columbia. This number does not include accidental pulling. Sorrell said most of these incidents took place in residence halls and Greek houses. Residences of the particular locations are not always the ones pulling the alarms.

"Oftentimes it's not people who live in the hall that are pulling the alarm, it's someone visiting or dropping off their girlfriend or whatever and when they leave they pull it," Sorrell said.

Sorrell said one of the problems with false alarms is they make it hard for people to determine when there is a real emergency. When residents get used to false alarms sounding, they might think it's another prank when there is a real emergency. Sorrell said this has happened in New Jersey at Seton Hall University.

"They had some 20 false alarms in the fall," Sorrell said. "When they came back after Christmas, the alarm goes off, nobody would evacuate because they were conditioned to false alarms. We ended up losing a couple of students. I don't want that complacency where people don't want to evacuate."

Residential Life Director Frankie Minor said every alarm that sounds should be taken seriously.

"We want students to believe that any time the alarm sounds they should assume it's a real fire," Minor said.

Sorrell said the false alarms also put people who have real emergencies in danger.

"It costs us time in response to other calls," Sorrell said. "It's definitely not funny, especially for the grandma two blocks down who's having a heart attack and her response is delayed."

Minor said there are also consequences on the campus level.

Sorrell said when someone pulls a fire alarm in the absence of an emergency on campus, they are arrested by the MU Police Department and could face up to a year in prison.

"The most likely sanction is removal from the residential hall," Minor said.

He also said tampering with fire safety equipment is illegal.

In 1999, freshman Dominic Passantino died in a fire at the Sigma Chi house because fire extinguishers had been tampered with prior to the fire. No extinguishers were available to help Passantino, who was trapped in his loft.

"When he was in there screaming and burning, the guys were taking Shakespeare's cups full of water and throwing them on his bed because they had had extinguisher fights, so they couldn't help their friend," Sorrell said.

Sorrell said these types of incidences are taken very seriously.