Bayview Residents Concerned Over Fire Alarms

Elise Gregg / Asst. News Director

An emergency evacuation at Biscayne Bay Campus housing has left residents concerned about their safety. 

Smoke from a resident kitchen set off Bayview’s fire alarms on the night of Jan 18. FIU Police evacuated the building, and then gave residents the all-clear to return to their rooms after confirming there wasn’t a fire.

Captain Delrish Moss of FIUPD said that residents were evacuated as a precaution until police could ensure that the building was secure. 

However, residents questioned safety after a third of the alarms didn’t go off, and because of how management handled the situation. 

The system had been checked by fire service DynaFire twice in the past two months, with an annual fire inspection done in December 2021. 

However, alarms failed to go off on the first three floors, leaving students unaware of a possible emergency. 

“Me and my roommates were just confused because we just looked outside and saw a bunch of people walking out, all the fire trucks, but our alarms did not go off,” said Kyshawnn Eulett, a former resident assistant (RA) who lives on the third floor at Bayview. 

Chabdieliz Gonzalez, a junior majoring in hospitality, showered through part of it.  

“I live on the second floor,” stated Gonzalez in an email. “I did not know this was happening until I got out of the shower and checked the group chat.”

In an email, Bayview Community Manager Misha Nelson stated that two Bayview staff members responded and FIUPD handled the situation.

“There have been no issues on site since the incident,” Nelson stated, thanking FIUPD for their work.

However, Eulett said that the RA who was on call at the time was the only one responsible for calling FIUPD and alerting residents. 

“It was literally just the RA and the residents,” said Eulett. “Management was nowhere to be found during this.”

Nelson stated that after hours, it is the RA’s responsibility to respond to situations and that emergencies are referred to managers on-call. 

Moss said that management can’t necessarily implement consistent communication during a crisis.

“I don’t think management would have the wherewithal to go around and warn everyone to leave the building,” said Moss. “In an emergency, they’d be evacuating like everyone else.”

Eulett added that management never communicated the issue with residents afterward, leaving many unclear about what happened.