On the way to class on Thursday, Nov. 8, students encountered a strange scene: multiple firetrucks, dozens of firefighters and a mysterious blue liquid on the street near Padre Rubio Hall and San Ignacio Hall.
SLU-Madrid staff member Oscar Medrano identified the blue liquid flowing down the road as gasoline that had leaked from a burst pipe at a nearby preschool, caused by a heater malfunction. The school, Escuela Infantil El Valle, which is across the street from Padre Rubio Hall on Avenida del Valle, was evacuated.
When asked what the soapy substance poured over the gasoline was, a firefighter explained that the mixture was made of water and anti-alcohol foam, used to protect against fire and contain the fumes from the leak About 40 minutes after the gasoline spill, parents from the nearby kindergarten began arriving to pick up their children. “We were asked to evacuate them,” one mother said hurriedly.
SLU student Claudia Carriol, who was walking to class when she noticed the blue liquid, said she initially believed that the gasoline smell came from a car explosion somewhere near campus but quickly realized otherwise.
“It started from that part of the street. I just saw a lot of blue — like a pile of blue liquid,” she said. “I was surprised, I thought, ‘Wow, it’s like a bunch of soap,’ and then I started smelling it and was like, ‘Oh, it’s gasoline.’” Carriol described what she saw upon arriving at the scene: “They [the SLU workers] noticed it, and all the maintenance guys came out and made phone calls. Then the firemen came, then the cops came; they started filling it up with soap.”
The danger of the gasoline leak was a concern for Carriol and a classmate. “One of my classmates, Amelia, came up to me and said, ‘I think they should cancel class today, because this could be really dangerous; for one, people are smoking out here too, you know?’”
At the time of the interview, around 11:30 a.m., Carriol herself was holding a cigarette. She continued: “I mean, one flick — if we flicked one cigarette or a lighter, or maybe anything that [might] combust – these cars right here, all these lined-up cars would have burst! Just imagine all these cars bursting from that leak.” “It seems like this maybe happens a lot in Spain, I don’t know, they’re not panicking,” she added.
Later on, other student smokers reported that they were told by staff not to smoke outside. The situation caught the attention of both bystanders and parents walking near the SLU campus. People were seen taking out their phones to photograph the scene, with some even stopping their strollers to take pictures.
