the
gazette
WED, DECEMBER 8, 2010VOL. 104, ISSUE
50
WESTERN’S DAILY STUDENT NEWSPAPER SINCE 1906
W W W . W E S T E R N G A Z E T T E . C A
Snowmageddon 2010
01110011 01101110 01101111 01110111 since 1906
>> Radar Perspective
City pummeled by snowstorm or three days
Arden Zwelling
ASSOCIATE EDITOR
As the snow continued to all overLondon Tuesday aternoon, theUniversity o Western Ontario andThe Spoke were orced to do theunthinkable.They cancelled Rick McGhie’s Wednesday night perormance.It was just the latest in a string o cancellations across London asa result o an unprecedented snow storm that has ground the univer-sity and most o the city to a haltor three days. While the ull extent o thestorm won’t be known until it ta-pers o sometime Wednesday evening, it is widely expected to beone o the worst in London’s 155- year history.The storm has relentlessly blanketed London with the white,uy stu since Sunday evening,piling anywhere rom 65-90 cm o snow in areas across the city. By Wednesday evening, the blizzardis expected to have dumped morethan a metre o snow on London— more than the city saw all o last winter.Throughout the day, the city urged local business owners toclose up shop and send their em-ployees home and asked motoriststo stay o the roads. It’s estimatedthe storm will cost London morethan $1 million to clean up.Meanwhile, Western ofcialsdecided to tell students to stay athome or a second straight day early Tuesday morning and laterin the day cancelled all classesand exams or Wednesday as well.The school aims to be back up andrunning on Thursday, just one day beore the start o mid-year ex-ams.The decision to cancel classesTuesday was made while moststudents were still asleep ater a4 a.m. meeting between Westernadministration, grounds crew leaders and campus police.“The snow conditions weresuch [that Western’s grounds crew]elt they could not have thingsappropriately and saely opera-tional,” Gitta Kulczycki, Western’svice-president resources and op-erations, said.Most o Tuesday’s on-campusevents had already been cancelledthe day beore, including an alum-ni luncheon with Western Presi-dent Amit Chakma.The snow was so heavy at West-ern’s Elgin Hall Tuesday morning that a blocked heating vent causeda carbon monoxide buildup in theresidence. Approximately 500 studentsand sta were evacuated around11 a.m. to Medway-SydenhamHall across the street where they waited or around an hour until it was sae to return.Despite plowing throughoutthe day on a practically empty campus, Western’s grounds crew was not able to keep up with thepace and volume o the snow Tuesday aternoon, orcing West-ern administration to extend thecampus closure through Wednes-day.“It was clear Mother Nature was delivering more snow morequickly than our sta could keepup with despite what I know weretheir best eorts,” Kulczycki said. Another major actor in theuniversity’s decision to shutdown campus on Wednesday was the London Transit Commis-sion, which pulled their buses o the roads at 3 p.m. Tuesday andplanned to keep them in the ga-rage until Thursday.“[Considering] London Tran-sit’s decision to suspend serviceor [Wednesday] based upon theroad conditions they were en-countering, it seemed the bestand saest thing to do was to close[campus on Wednesday,]” Kulc-zycki said.The biggest worry or most stu-dents is what eect the storm willhave on exams which begin Friday and run until Dec. 23. Wednesday’s closure comesour years to the day ater exams were canceled on Dec. 8, 2006due to inclement weather. Asiderom this storm, Western has beenorced to shut down campus justour times in the last six years —all in the month o December.However exams were only everaected during the 2006 closureand Kulczycki was confdent thecurrent storm would not aect theexam schedule.“Students should expect thatexams will proceed as scheduledon Friday and plan accordingly,”Kulczycki said. “At this point, we’rehoping to get ahead o the snow on Wednesday, such that we canopen on Thursday,” While unlikely, i campus wasorced to shut down until the weekend, Friday’s exams could berescheduled beore the new yearas the university has a ree day built into the exam schedule orextenuating circumstances likethese.Once Western’s crews havecleared the roads and walkwayson campus, their ocus will turnto removing the snow rom schoolgrounds all together. Despite asprawling campus, the university has run out o places to put all thesnow.“Our crews are working to movethe snow into piles such that weget clearance in the areas where we need them,” Kulczycki said.“Once the snow all ceases, we willneed to be transporting some o the snow o campus — we simply don’t have room to locate it all.”
Corey Stanord
GAZETTE
TIME TO GO SNOW SURFING.
Getting around town yesterday was challenging due to a massive snowall.
T h e S no w D a y S p e c i a l
The most memorable news moments rom frst semester
Recap>
News in Review
UWOFA Strike
The threat o a aculty strikeon Western’s campus weighedheavy on the minds o students,well past the 12:01 a.m. strikedeadline.
Steyn Speaks
Mark Steyn’s visit to Londonbrought with it a signicantamount o attention, criticismand letters. His speech wasmoved several times.
Renovation Delays
An inaccurate bid by a contractororced delays to the renovationsin the University CommunityCentre, pushing the ocial dead-line to December.
The New Western
Western announced a $265K re-branding study that was switlycriticized by UWOFA or being anunnecessary expense — a chargeWestern ocials disagreed with.
Culture o Control
Western and the University Stu-dents’ Council were criticized bysome campus groups, includingcheerleaders and some sophs, orwhat they called excessive con-trol during O-Week.
ENVIRONMENT CANADA
Tuesday at 11:43 a.m.Tuesday at 9:49 p.m.
b.s.s.
One o Canada’s most iconic indie bands makes its wayto London. Full interview >> pg.5
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www.westerngazette.ca
Monica Blaylock
NEWS EDITOR
Five o Western’s most promising entrepreneurs made the cut orthis year’s The Next 36 — one o Canada’s most prestigious entre-preneurial leadership competi-tions.The goal o the competition isto help launch the careers o 36 o Canada’s most promising and in-novative undergraduates.From over 1,000 applicants, 64fnalists were selected to competeat the National Selection Weekendthis past weekend at the Univer-sity o Toronto or a spot in thecoveted Next 36. At the end o the weekend, fve Western students were among those selected: Saumya Krishna,Danish Ajmeri, Nadeem Nathoo,Holly Smith and Ronen Benin.The National Selection week-end consisted o a series o discus-sion groups, keynote speakers andinterviews conducted by some o Canada’s top business leaders andbusiness proessors.The fnal 36 students will spendthe summer at U o T in an “en-trepreneurship bootcamp” withclasses taught by guest lecturersrom around the world.They will also work in groupso our on a new business venture.Each group will be given $50,000in capital, mentorship rom busi-ness leaders and access to pro-grammers to invent, launch andsell a product or service or a mo-bile environment. The team withthe highest valuation o their busi-ness venture in August will win thecompetition. While most o the groupshaven’t decided on their ventureideas, Nathoo noted his group hasdetermined the direction o theirproject.“[We have] agreed that thebusiness we create should havepositive societal implications, in-stead o exploiting consumers,”Nathoo said.Not all the fnalists came rom abusiness background, or attendedthe Richard Ivey School o Busi-ness.“The whole weekend was agreat learning experience. All o the fnalists are incredibly talent-ed and intelligent people. I am ac-tually studying physiology, so thisis going to be a very dierent andexciting experience,” Smith said.The program provides an op-portunity or students to expandtheir horizons and, according toNathoo, learn the skills needed orthe next generation to ourish.“Personally, I think this pro-gram is great motivation or stu-dents to realize their potential. Inone o my interviews I was asked,‘Why do you want to be involved with this program?’ Part o my answer was that there is no suchthing as the ‘right’ opportunity. Itis up to us as leaders o tomorrow to make right rom an opportuni-ty,” Nathoo said.
“Next Five” ound at Western
Thesis backlashat U o T
The University o Toronto is re-ceiving backlash or a thesis sub-mitted by one o their students.Jenny Peto, a U o T mastersstudent, submitted a thesis titled“The Victimhood o the Powerul: White Jews, Zionism and the Rac-ism o Hegemonic Holocaust Edu-cation.”In her thesis, Peto denouncedthe March o Remembrance andHope. During the march, studentstravel with Holocaust survivors tosee the locations o Nazi atrocities.“She created a thesis based noton an interview or any kind o re-sponsible act gathering,” Carla Wittes, director o programming or the Canadian Centre or Di-versity, explained. The centre runsthe march.“We were shocked and oend-ed by the thesis,” Wittes explained. While unable to comment onspecifc theses, U o T provost,Cheryl Misak, explained in a state-ment, “O the thousands o MA theses written at the University o Toronto, in partial ulfllment o degree requirements, it is inevi-table that some will have elementsthat oend various individualsand groups.“In such cases, the university is committed to allowing and en-couraging a ull range o debate.” Wittes noted she was given thethesis by several concerned sourc-es. She elt the claims in the thesis were unreasonable.“It’s possible to make alsestatements when you don’t check your sources.”Misak explained the ability orstudents to interrogate subjectshowever they chose was embod-ied in the statement o reedom o speech by U o T.“All members o the university must have as a prerequisite ree-dom o speech and expression, which means the right to exam-ine, question, investigate, specu-late, and comment on any issue without reerence to prescribeddoctrine, as well as the right tocriticize the university and society at large.” Wittes explained her organiza-tion was not going to challengethe student’s degree.
— Cheryl Stone
News Bries
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sday, December 8, 2010
THANK YOU
To all volunteers, editors andsta who work tirelessly tomake this newspaper hap-pen our times every week. You are the unsung heroeso this campus and you havemy respect, admiration andgratitude.Sincerely,Stuart A. ThompsonEditor-in-Chie
Lauren Pelley
CREATIVE DIRECTOR
Elgin Hall residence was evacu-ated Tuesday morning ater highlevels o carbon monoxide weredetected in the building.Sergeant Steve Dykeman o Campus Community Police Ser-vice said fre ofcials ound thecause to be snow piled up arounda urnace vent. The snow pre-vented the carbon monoxide — apotentially deadly ume — romventing outside properly.London has received severaleet o snowall in the past 48hours, so fre ofcials had littletrouble determining the cause o the gas buildup.“Some o [the vents] aren’tmore than three or our eet o theground,” Dykeman said.Susan Grindrod, associate vice-president o housing and ancillary services, said fre ofcials, resi-dence sta and members o thePhysical Plant department havebeen checking all the outside ur-nace vents to prevent another oc-currence. Yesterday’s evacuation o around 500 students and sta took place ater a carbon monoxide de-tector was activated in one o thebuilding’s units, prompting CCPSto pull a fre alarm as a saety pre-caution.“The students were evacuatedin an orderly ashion,” Grindrodsaid, adding they were sent acrossthe street to Medway Hall whileElgin was being inspected.Though the evacuation wentsmoothly and there have beenno reported symptoms rom thecarbon monoxide, this incidentserves a reminder o the potentialdangers o this common house-hold gas.Two years ago, carbon monox-ide poisoning claimed the lives o an Ontario Provincial Police ofcerand her entire amily — including her husband and two children —in Woodstock, Ontario. The cause was a clogged chimney vent, butthe deaths could have been pre-vented i the home had a working carbon monoxide detector.Just last week, members o allthree provincial parties voted insupport o a new private mem-ber’s bill to mandate the use o carbon monoxide detectors in allOntario homes. Ater a second reading lastThursday, the bill has now beensent to legislative committee.The London Fire Departmentrecommends placing detectorsclose to bedrooms, and near theurnace room or other areas wherecarbon monoxide might accumu-late. According to the LFD’s website,carbon monoxide is produced by a variety o devices, including ur-naces, boilers, room heaters, hot water heaters, stoves and grills.“Carbon monoxide is anodourless, colourless gas which isextremely toxic,” notes the web-site. The gas produces an eectcalled chemical asphyxiation. Es-sentially, it leads to suocationas it lowers the blood’s ability tocarry oxygen.Symptoms o carbon monoxidepoisoning may include headache,nausea and atigue, but prolongedexposure to the gas can lead tobrain damage and death.This gas has been dubbed the“silent killer” since it is impossibleto detect without a carbon mon-oxide detector.Fire ofcials recommend regu-larly checking carbon monoxide-producing devices and their ac-companying vents — particularly during the winter.“I just went outside andchecked my own,” Grindrod saidduring a phone interview rom herhome. “Students in some o thoseold houses should do the same.”
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Elgin Hall evacuatedor carbon monoxide
FILE PHOTO
REMEMBER WHEN THERE WAS GREEN?
Elgin Hall was evacuated bycampus police ater carbon monoxide detectors were activated
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