Cold reception
Students, some still dripping wet, were evacuated from Imperial’s new sports centre twice in the first three days of opening. Photo: Felix/VL
Sports centre evacuated twice in first week
Ethos, Imperial's new sports centre has had a disappointing first week. Yesterday lunchtime and on Tuesday night, dozens of students were forced out into the cold after the fire alarm was activated.
Students shivered outside in the cold, wrapped in emergency aluminium sheeting provided by sports centre staff. The swimmers, some still dressed in swimming gear, were taken to Weeks hall to keep warm. Andy Horsfall, a fourth year Civil Engineering student, told Felix he was "a bit cold", but it had "all been going swimmingly well up until now". The building was quickly declared safe by Imperial's security officers and the students were allowed to return to their sporting activities.
Despite these incidents, the long-awaited opening of the multi-million pound sports centre has been very well received. Melissa Turcotte told Felix, "the gym is very impressive". Anthony Bailey, a third year Civil Engineering student, was also impressed with the facilities and will be "coming to the gym to watch Sky" on the individual TV screens. Bailey said the one drawback had been queuing for an induction, "I had to queue for an hour and half to get an appointment".
Inductions have been a hassle for many students. Turcotte said, "It's very annoying that you have to wait so long for induction and that you can't use the gym without it." Neil Mosley, Head of Sport and Leisure, is aware of the problem. He told Felix, "We have drafted in extra staff to deal with demand, and even more staff will be brought in over the next few days".
Rupert Neate, Editor
Felix's View:
The untimely evacuations of the Ethos sports centre are, unfortunately, overshadowing the opening of what is undoubtedly a fantastic new facility here at Imperial. Incidents such as these are likely to happen in the teething stages of new buildings, it's just unfortunate that Ethos has been particularly plagued by hitches and delays.
Although the sports centre management have acted quickly to draft in extra staff to deal with the demand for inductions, why didn't they have the extra staff from the beginning? There has never been any question that demand for the centre would be great, indeed this newspaper predicted as much last year.
If you haven't yet been to Ethos, we urge you to get down there now. It really is superb, much better than many private health clubs, such as FitnessFirst which charges students more than £40 a month. Felix beseeches College management to keep the centre free-to-use on a permanent basis. It's about time that College recognises the importance of sport.
