SNOW JOKE

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Snow blanketed the campus yesterday, prompting an afternoon of canceled classes, slippery sidewalks, sledding and snowball fights.

Doug Trigg, a freshman materials science engineering major, used makeshift skis on the hill behind McKeldin Library, while football games raged on the other side of the building.

Using an idea he said he got from friends at home, Trigg duct-taped an old pair of flip-flops to a pair of trays from the dining halls and used them to ski down the hill, a plan he had developed before the snow arrived.

"I almost threw out the sandals, but then I thought I could use them [to make skis] come winter," he said.

Emily Morse, a sophomore psychology major and one of Trigg's friends, said the first thing she thought when she heard classes were canceled was that she wanted to go sledding.

"I was really excited, because I missed the sledding last year," she said.

Provost Nariman Farvardin said the decision to cancel classes was driven by safety considerations. He said he originally assessed the situation at 5 a.m., at which time the snow was not bad enough to cancel morning classes.

But Farvardin said when the snow continued to fall during morning classes and he saw the weather forecast called for more snow, he decided the university should be shut down so students and faculty could get home safely.

"We decided we just don't want to take any risks," he said.

Director of Building and Landscape Services Harry Teabout, who works with the provost to decide whether to cancel class for inclement weather, said the decision to do so was not made until about 10 a.m. yesterday morning.

"We looked at the weather the day before, so we weren't caught off guard," Teabout said. "But we were having issues with the sidewalks. There was a lot of freezing rain and snow, and they kept predicting more."

"We always wait to make the call until it happens," he added. "Part of the problem is we've been crystal dry until now."

The university has not had a full snow day since February 2007.

Alex Gorman, a junior business major, questioned the decision not to cancel classes immediately. He said Farvardin should have known to cancel classes because of the school closings in the surrounding counties and the forecast for the day, which included a lot of snow. He also said the decision was a poor one, considering the number of students who commute to the campus every day.

"By the time the announcement of the closing went out, most people had already gotten up, cleaned off their cars and left," he said. "[The provost] blew that call."

Teabout said when there is a prediction of any sort of snow or freezing rain, Facilities Management takes extra measures to prepare, such as pre-treating the roads, parking lots and sidewalks with salt. But yesterday, they pre-treated the roads, yet not the sidewalks.

"That was the big problem," Teabout said.

He said no decision to close school in the future will be made until the morning of the day in question.

Junior criminology major Moses Lee did not seem too concerned by the safety risks related to the snow as he snowboarded down the hill outside Tydings Hall He said he has been waiting for the snow to come since he saw a weather report Sunday night.

"I figured by the end of the day, we'd have free time," he said. Lee added, though, that he does not think the free time will extend past one day.

Meanwhile, McKeldin Mall played host to as many as five separate football games. Players bobbled passes with snowy gloves and slid across the melting snow, finishing long runs with snow angel touchdown dances. No one seemed to notice the broken pipe flooding the area around the sundial.

Sophomore electrical engineering major Jeff Gunnerson was playing a pickup game with five of his roommates. Covered in snow, they said they had been playing for about 90 minutes, and before that had been sledding down anything with a slope, including two hills and the steps of Francis Scott Key Hall.

"It's a wonderful way to start the semester," Gunnerson said.

Late in the day, the snow had been stripped from the hill behind McKeldin Library, but more than a dozen students still rode down the hill on everything from sleds to pilfered dining hall trays.

Freshman government and politics major Emily Turner was heading back to her dorm with a moving box under her arm.

"I was sledding in it!" she said. "Well, not this one, exactly. The one I was riding in is in shreds now."

So why the new box?

"What if it snows tomorrow?" she answered.

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