GUILDERLAND — The call came in at 12:34 a.m. on Tuesday, said McKownville Fire Chief Russ Becker, who responded to a fire in a dormitory on the University at Albany campus on Feb. 23.

The fire was in a third-floor suite in Oneida Hall in Indian Quad, said the university’s director of media relations, Karl Luntta.

According to Becker, when he first arrived on campus and learned from plant staff that smoke was present and that the sprinkler system had been activated, he sent out a call for other area departments to respond as well.

When the first engine arrived and Becker sent in a crew to investigate, they were able to locate the source of the fire, but the sprinklers had already “done their job and mostly put the fire out.”

The cause of the fire was determined to be an unattended candle, said Luntta.

“A large volume of water had been discharged and affected all four floors” of the dorm, Becker said.

Firefighters went from room to room, making sure that all residents had evacuated, “just in case the situation should get worse,” he said. 

The university had people on scene to get residents to an alternative shelter, Becker said. “I think they were directing them to lounge areas and spaces like that.”

Later that same day, students were allowed back into their rooms in Oneida Hall, after water damage had been cleaned up, Luntta said. The three or four young women in the suite where the fire started had not yet been allowed back into the suite as of Tuesday night. The university was providing them with different accommodations on campus, Luntta said.

Luntta specified that the only sprinklers that went off were in the affected suite, and said that other water damage must have been from seepage through ceilings.

Becker said that the only water damage in the dorm came from the one sprinkler that was activated. “We did not flow any water into the building,” he said of the firefighters.

Asked if he is happy to see sprinkler systems when he arrives at a fire, Becker said, “Absolutely. They imply water damage, but they generally do a good job of preventing the spread of fire. If fire had spread into other rooms, it could have been a very different outcome.”

Becker added that the dorms on the uptown campus — some in the city of Albany and some in the town of Guilderland — are more than 40 years old, but that the university has done a “good job” of retrofitting them with better alarms and with sprinkler systems.

Luntta said that every university residence hall has sprinklers. Newer halls and those that have already been renovated have them in every individual bedroom, as well as in common spaces. Those that have not yet been renovated — the university, like all the schools in the state system, is on a schedule for doing them gradually — have them only in common spaces. Oneida Hall is one of those that has already been renovated, he said.

He added that, in all University at Albany residence halls, “We have upgraded to modern and fully addressable heat and smoke detectors in every room, with both audible and visible indicators.”

Luntta said that damage to residents’ possessions caused by fire is not the responsibility of the university. He said that the university strongly encourages students to purchase renter's insurance or check that items in their rooms are covered under their parents’ homeowner’s insurance.