Residents of Rountree Commons suspect that someone is trying to burn down the residence hall.

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure that someone is trying to torch this place,” freshman mechanical engineering major Alex Fuego said. “I honestly don’t know why. It’s a sweet place to live.”

Fire alarms have gone off several times a week every week since the beginning of the fall semester. Residents have received numerous emails about the incidents, reminding them to put water in their ramen and not to set the trash rooms on fire anymore. There have been several evacuations that have been caused by burnt Easy Mac.

Easy Mac-related fires have increased 129 percent since the invention of the microwave, whereas ramen noodle-related fires have increased by a mere 6.02 x 10^23 percent.

When asked about what she thought was going on, resident assistant Laura Sparks attributed the incidents to the fact that the pyrotechnic club meets in the residence hall’s classroom every Thursday night.

“Over half that club lives in this building, and no one is looking at them? That’s ridiculous,” said Sparks.

The Exponent reached out to the president, vice president and secretary of the pyrotechnic club, who all wished not to comment.

This is not the first time that a University of Wisconsin System school has dealt with fires within residence halls. In 2012, a UW-River Falls residence hall reported numerous fires in their kitchens and laundry rooms, which were later attributed to freshmen having poor homemaking skills, as well as electrical issues within the building, due to an infestation of something of an undisclosed species, per the school’s ResLife blog. The fire issue was cleared up by the next fall, though there are still scorch marks on the ceiling of the kitchen because they, “don’t have a ladder tall enough to reach,” according to the aforementioned blog.

The Department of Residence Life wishes to remind students that arson is a serious crime that will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. If you have any information about the fires or if you see any suspicious activity, please contact the University Police at 608.876.5309 or the Platteville Police at 608-334-0000.