As the final event in its four-part event series for Campus Fire Safety Month, the department of risk management and safety hosted a showing of the film “After the Fire” on Sept. 28 from 7-9
The protagonists of the documentary made an appearance and gave a talk on the importance of fire safety after the film was shown.
“Everyone that we’ve talked to – our nursing professors, other students that have been to this – said that this is such a moving experience,” said Brett Vanderlinden, senior in nursing.
The event was attended by Auburn’s Fire Department’s firefighters.
“On college
The film “After the Fire” is based on The New York Times Bestseller and Pulitzer Prize-winning book “After the Fire” by Robin Fisher, which describes the aftermath of the Seton Hall fire.
The book and movie narrate a tragic dorm room fire in 2000 that killed three students and injured over 50 more. Both the film and the book focus on the recovery process of students Shawn Simons and Alvaro Llanos who received life-threatening burns from the fire.
“I teared up,” said Mackenzie Stanford, junior in industrial and systems engineering. “I didn’t realize how involved the [event] was.”
Stanford was not the only emotional viewer as sniffles could be heard throughout the auditorium while the movie played.
“No matter how many times we give this presentation, it never gets any easier to see what we had to go through,” Simons said while speaking after the film. “We probably should have told you before we showed the documentary that it’s an emotional roller coaster.”
Llanos described the difficulty he had returning to a normal life with permanent tissue damage.
“I started to realize that before society could accept me, I had to learn to accept myself. I had to learn to love myself; we all ought to learn to love ourselves a little more,” Llanos said.
Llanos and Simons stressed the importance of not tampering with smoke detectors and said that the greatest fire risk is for students who live in off-campus housing, which is not always as safe.
Both Llanos and Simons recommended that residence advisors constantly remind
“It’s so important that [RAs] enforce all the [rules],” Simons said. “It’s up to you guys to prevent those things from happening.”
Simons said RAs and students have to follow the directives, no one should have candles in their rooms.
Simmons and Llanos travel to over 200 campuses each year to tell students about the importance of fire safety, and they often visit hospitals’ burn units where they provide encouragement to other fire victims.
“We had some [nursing] students attend last year, and they said it was the best thing they had done at Auburn,” said assistant professor Ann Lambert. “We encouraged our students to come this year.”
Assistant professor Morgan Yordy said he thinks it’s a good video to show for future nurses to see the struggles on all sides
After the
One student who attended three of the four fire safety events qualified to win a Yeti cooler.
In addition to prizes, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen provided free chicken dinners and soda to all participants.
Simmons and Llanos met students at a booth afterward where they sold signed copies of the book and film and took photos.
“Fire does not have any prejudice,” Simons said. “We hope never any other campus has to deal with anything like [the Seton Hall fire].”
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