Rumbles Causing Grumbles in Humanities

Students and professors who have classes in Humanities Hall Rooms 117 or 116 may have noticed a loud rumbling sound in those rooms, emanating from the mechanical room directly below those classrooms. The sound is clearly audible in those two rooms, and some are complaining about the noise.

“It’s terrible,” said Professor Veronika Dolar, who teaches an ECO 11 course in room 117 at 11 a.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays. “I feel like I always have to talk over it,” she said. Tyler McLaughlin, a senior broadcasting major who has CMA 10 class in the room at 9:30 a.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays, has also noticed the noise. “The noise in the classroom is really disruptive especially when you’re trying to focus,” he said. McLaughlin said he’d like the noise to be dealt with.

However, the Pioneer also reached out to other professors who teach in both rooms 117 and 116, Doug Augenthaler, Colby Valentine, Gale Kaplan, Kathleen Feeley, and Edmond Niemczura, all of whom said they did not notice a noise problem.

William Kirker, director of facilities services, noted he had not heard of any noise complaints prior to this. Upon hearing about this annoyance, though, he inspected the mechanical room below those two classrooms, and found that the noise is coming from two pumps in that room. “The pumps themselves are not making much noise,” he explained. “But they must be hitting a certain frequency that is causing the noise that is easily heard and aggravating to people.”

Kirker said that he will look into the two pumps to see if there may be a bearing that is starting to wear.