Collegiate Times

A pipe burst in Rasche Hall early yesterday morning, causing minimal damage after residents of the cadet barracks redirected the ensuing flood.

Rick Johnson, director of housing and dining at Virginia Tech, said students responded to the leak on the fifth floor bathroom with towels and other equipment to relocate the water.

?The corps did a great job once they saw what was happening,? Johnson said.

Although the water flooded to the lower floors of the building and destroyed floor tiles in a fourth-floor room, Johnson said the property damage was minimal.

?It looks like computers and things like that escaped damage,? he said.

Capt. Jim Snyder, deputy commandant of the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets, confirmed that the damage did not appear to be permanent and the affected students were only temporarily without housing.

Alan Campbell, a senior Spanish major and resident advisor in Rasche Hall, described the scene.

?A water line burst on the fifth floor, and the line was behind a housekeeping closet,? Campbell said.

Because no one with a key to the housekeeping closet was available, Campbell said the students in the building, who were shoveling water away with blue recycling bins among other makeshift equipment, had to wait for Tech security guards and other emergency personnel to open the door and stop the water flow.

?Pretty much everyone rallied together,? he said.

Campbell said the flood happened shortly after midnight and affected the old section of the building that parallels Shanks Hall.

No one was able to determine the cause of the burst pipe. Representatives from Student Programs along with Risk Management officials surveyed the building yesterday and found little property damage, Johnson said.