A hot-pot left on in 308 Lord Hall Friday morning started a fire that caused about $8,000 worth of damage to the room and to the personal belongings of the residents.
Shakari Cameron '96 and Nada Payne '96, who lived in 308 Lord, said that their belongsings did not suffer much damage in the fire -- most of the damage was to the walls and the ceiling.
Payne said in an electronic-mail message that seeing much of her room damaged was devastating.
"When I got to my room, the fire trucks were there and the firemen still inside," she said.
"Five or six people were asking me questions at once, so it was a little overwhelming," she said. "When I walked into the room, I think I was just in shock -- I was so horrified at the sight."
Cameron said in an electronic mail message that most of the damage came from the smoke.
"We had to have all of our clothes and washables cleaned because of the soot," she said. "It has been a truly devastating experience -- it's times like this when you really find out who your friends are."
The College relocated Cameron and Payne to the first floor of Lord, but they are living with friends.
A press release issued by the Hanover Fire Department said it responded to a fire alarm at about 10:30 a.m. There fire was contained in a single-room and there were no injuries.
"The cause of the fire is blamed on a hot-pot," the press release said.
The Hanover fire department units were back in the station at about 12:30.
Director of Residential Operations Woody Eckels said Cameron and Payne will not have to pay for the room damages.
"We aren't approaching this as if it was their fault and they don't have to pay anything," he said. "It was an accident."
Hanover Police Sergeant Patrick O'Neil was on the scene of the fire Friday morning.
"There was a small hot-pot that is used to boil water that had been left on," he said.
O'Neil said the pot's electrical cords were melted.
O'Neil said there was a cardboard box next to the hot pot, which apparently caught on fire.
He also said a couch near the box went up in flames, and "things escalated from that point."
Most of the damage in the room was from the smoke, O'Neil said.
He said because many of the dormitories are brick with thick doors, fires usually stay contained in one room.
"The room was black and a lot of the plaster on the ceiling had come down," he said. "It was basically a mess."
Payne praised the College for being helpful in the last few days.
"ORL has been so helpful to both myself and my roommate -- they seem to have anticipated all our needs thus far, and have tried hard to make this disaster a little easier for us to deal with," she said.
Joe Parlavecchio '96, who lives directly under Cameron and Payne, said there was slight damage to his room because the fire department had to spray down room 308 with water.
"It wasn't really too much damage," Parlavecchio said.
"They had to hose it down, so there was some water leaking through the roof," he added.
Eckels said the room's smoke detectors and fire alarms "worked perfectly" and about 50 residents of Lord evacuated the building.
But, he said, firefighters conducting a room-to-room search found six people in the building an hour after the fire started who were either asleep or had not left their rooms.
"People really, really need to pay attention to the fire alarm," he said.
