Investigation Underway After Penn State Campus Building Evacuated

Updated 5:52 p.m. Nov. 12.

Police, fire officials and engineers are investigating an incident on Wednesday afternoon that forced the evacuation of a building on Penn State’s University Park campus, according to the university.

Alpha Fire Company was called to the scene at 1:35 p.m. for inside investigation of “a sound of an explosion,” at the Susan Welch Liberal Arts Building, 137 Fischer Road, according to a Centre County 911 dispatch. Alpha Chief Tony Berrena told StateCollege.com partner publication Onward State that crews observed a crack in the wall of the building from the second floor to the roof and that the floor had settled about 2 inches.

Berrena said he believed that the foundation could have shifted or a steam line may have broken, though no alarms sounded to signify a burst. Engineers and a bomb squad swept the building, and steam technicians were surveying the area.

No one was injured, and the incident posed “no ongoing threat” to the public, university officials said in a statement.

Those who work or study in the building will receive updates from their dean and instructors about their classes or workplace, according to the university

Fischer Road was temporarily closed at the Allen Road intersection, but has since reopened to traffic.

The six-story, 143,000-square foot Susan Welch Liberal Arts Building opened in January. It is home to the departments of anthropology, political science and sociology and criminology, the School of Public Policy, Criminal Justice Research Center, Matson Museum of Anthropology, McCourtney Institute for Democracy and Social Science Research Institute.