Smoke from a mulch fire caused the Fine Arts Library and the lower level of Campbell Hall at the Architecture School to be evacuated yesterday.
The fire, which occurred after 10 a.m. behind Campbell Hall, disrupted Prof. Reuben Rainey's LAR 512, "Landscape Architecture History" class, said Dick Smith, facilities coordinator for the Architecture School.
"There is no damage to the buildings," Smith said. "The rooms took an hour to clear and the smell still lingered in the building throughout the afternoon."
Smoke from the fire wafted into the air-intake system, Smith said.
"It was right near an air-intake into the building and our three big lecture halls were filled with smoke within a few minutes," Smith said.
Architecture School Dean Karen Van Lengen, who was in the lecture room during the incident, said the fire was dealt with very quickly.
"There just came a moment when you could smell quite a bit of smoke and there was smoke in the hallway," Van Lengen said. "Apparently it wasn't a large fire."
Van Lengen explained that the school was evacuated until about noon, when the fire department had thoroughly checked the buildings.
The fire was put out before the Charlottesville Fire Department's arrival, said Jeff Garrison, battalion chief of the Charlottesville Fire Department.
It was caused by "discarded smoking material," Garrison said. "The people in the coffee shop had taken an extinguisher" to the fire.
Fire department officials remained on the scene to make sure everything was under control, Garrison said.
"We had made sure all of the smoke was evacuated from the building and then allowed the students and occupants back in," Garrison said.
Though the fire disrupted classes, it did not seem to be a huge emergency,second-year Architecture student Kelly Whitton, who was in the evacuated class, said.
"We were just sitting there in lecture [and]... it smelled like someone brought in a bag of burnt popcorn," Whitton said. "I wasn't worried at all ... there weren't flames and it wasn't heavy smoke -- it even took a while to notice."
Garrison explained that the fire was not an unexpected occurrence for this time of year.
"We have a lot of mulch fires at different locations because of the dry conditions," Garrison said. "With the dry conditions, people discard their smoking material into the mulch and it causes problems."
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