An explosion on the Texas Tech College campus in Lubbock set off fires and energy outages Wednesday, main faculty officers to situation evacuation orders for a number of buildings and cancel courses for the remainder of the week.
An alert despatched to the campus neighborhood round 8:45 p.m. described the explosion as occurring at a substation however a later replace mentioned it was at a manhole.
No accidents have been reported, Lubbock Fireplace Rescue Capt. Jon Tunnell mentioned.
Movies circulating on social media and native TV stations confirmed a heavy presence of firefighters on campus and fireplace and smoke popping out of at the least one manhole cowl.
It wasn’t clear what might need induced the explosion.
Energy can be shut right down to your entire campus in Lubbock, Texas, whereas repairs are underway, mentioned Caitlynn Jeffries, a spokesperson for the college’s police division.
“You possibly can go forward and go residence for Spring break. We’re closing faculty down for the subsequent couple days,” Jeffries mentioned.
The college additionally instructed school and employees to work remotely if attainable till additional discover.
Lubbock Fireplace Rescue responded to a attainable fuel leak round 7 p.m. native time and located “a number of manhole covers with smoke and fireplace issuing from them,” Tunnell mentioned.
“This stays a really energetic scene as crews proceed to help Texas Tech College in mitigating this emergency,” he mentioned.
There are greater than 40,000 college students at Texas Tech and the varsity sits on 1,800 acres in West Texas.
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