Medford, Ore. — It started as a normal day for freshman Richard Bates at Rogue Community College in downtown Medford.
Bates said “I was on my computer in the corner. Just minding my own business.” Minding his own business in the atrium of the higher education building. That’s when he heard something out of the norm. “I heard a crack and looked up and there was glass falling. I blocked my head with my forearms.”
Bates says a large piece of glass came loose from a third story wall, crashed on a ledge, and shattered. Shards of glass fell on many students below. Bates said “a piece of glass hit my head and bounced off, it wasn’t too bad.”
But one of his fellow students took the brunt of it. He said “the blood was starting to come out of her scalp, so a guy pulled out his phone and called 911.”
Medics took the student to the hospital, while the college closed part of the building and started looking into what went wrong.
Executive Director of SOU, Jeanne Stallman said “first step is we have facilities in cleaning things up, security is accessing the situation, together they will access what happened, and why, and make sure that we are safe.”
As for Richard Bates, he said he and his peers did what they could after the day took a turn for the worst. “Everybody was really worried about her, everybody was helping out immediately,” according to Bates.
The condition of the student taken to the hospital is not known at this time, but it was believed by students and school officials that she is going to be okay.
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