First week of classes brings first snow closure

Story by Alicia Steele, Staff writer

Emily Harris/The News Due to winter storm Jonas, President Davies declared university delays and closure to ensure student safety. During the storm, Murray received more than four and a half inches of snow.
Emily Harris/The News
Due to winter storm Jonas, President Davies declared university delays and closure to ensure student safety. During the storm, Murray received more than four and a half inches of snow.

Murray State students received an email at 3 p.m. Thursday, stating “Winter Weather Update – University Closure.”

“Murray State University will officially close tonight – Thursday, Jan. 21 – at 10 p.m. and this closure will continue all day Friday,” President Bob Davies said in an email to the Murray State community.

As predicted, winter storm Jonas delivered, causing Gov. Matt Bevin to place the entire state of Kentucky under a state emergency.     Davies tweeted a photo of campus Friday morning, confirming that closing campus was in fact “the right decision.”

“Be safe today – it was treacherous out there,” Davies tweeted.

Some students chose to celebrate their day off by gathering on the lawn of Oakhurst for a snowman building contest and afterwards joined the president and his family for hot chocolate in his home.

Davies tweeted that some of the snowmen that appeared on the lawn of Oakhurst included a family of snails, a snowman from Lambda Chi Alpha, a snowman from Campus Ministries, a ninja turtle snowman, an entry from the International Students Organization an entry from Springer/Franklin and the winner of the contest, the upside down snowman.

One student was pictured doing a head stand with the upside down snowman.

“Love it when a student tries to imitate a snowman!” Davies tweeted.

Other students spent the day upholding the yearly tradition of sledding down the hill by the Curris Center, some spent the day inside away from the weather and others spent the day playing in the snow with fellow students.

Emily Harris/The News Due to winter storm Jonas, President Davies declared university delays and closure to ensure student safety. During the storm, Murray received more than four and a half inches of snow.
Emily Harris/The News
Due to winter storm Jonas, President Davies declared university delays and closure to ensure student safety. During the storm, Murray received more than four and a half inches of snow.

“I spent the day in the snow with my friends,” Paige Effinger, sophomore from Evansville, Indiana, said.

Effinger said it was a nice day off because once college comes to an end, snow days with friends will be a thing of the past and getting days off because of bad weather will be much less frequent.

“It was a good day spent with some good friends,” Effinger said.

Hannah Rickard, freshman from Eddyville, Kentucky, spent the day sledding down the hill by the Curris Center and the hill by the soccer field with her sorority sisters.

“We had so much fun and it is always great to get together with friends like that,” Rickard said. “Especially after a long break!”

Rickard said although she was ready to get back to classes when she returned from the month-long break, it was in the best interest of the safety of the students, especially commuters.

She said she was surprised by how much snow Murray got this time — more than four and half inches.

“Normally we expect this kind of weather in February and March,” Rickard said. “So who knows what is going to happen in the months to come!”

Rickard said the snow day was fun, but she was glad to get back to classes on Monday.

Classes resumed as normal Monday with above freezing temperatures, melting winter storm Jonas’ wrath.

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