Flooding disrupts University of Pittsburgh campus
PITTSBURGH —
Flooding at the University of Pittsburgh campus in Oakland caused power outages, damaged facilities and disrupted classes, leaving crews working to clean up the mess.
“It was scary. I didn’t expect Pittsburgh to get such crazy weather,” Pitt student Ethan Su said.
Muddy water flowed from outside into the recreation and fitness center at Trees Hall, leaving the facility flooded. Pittsburgh’s Action News 4 obtained a photo from a student showing the water.
“You know they have the turning doors, right? It was so much brown water just flooding in. It was nasty. It was terrible,” Su said. “The water was coming up to my feet. My socks were all wet. It was super dirty, too. I was really uncomfortable walking in it.”
“The gym had flooded inside, so they had a mudslide thing behind the gym, and then it went through the doors into the entrance. It was pretty crazy. They had all this stuff on the floor drying it up,” Pitt student Zac Lucia said.
Videos of the flooding and damaged facilities have been circulating on social media, showing the extent of the bad weather’s impact on the Oakland campus. Cleanup crews are now working to restore the affected areas.
“They did a good job cleaning up. The rec center looks a lot better now, so they did a great job cleaning it all up,” Su said.
“But we did have to do class outside in this really tiny room instead of in our lab where we are supposed to do it because there was a huge puddle inside,” Pitt student Eleanor Swanson said.
A Pitt spokesperson said, “Like many areas of the city, the University of Pittsburgh experienced some minor building flooding in Oakland. Cleanup began last night.”
Carnegie Mellon University reported minimal physical impact on its campus following the severe weather.