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I am an Ole Miss alum and we are all so saddened by this tragedy. Ole Miss is very much a family. ATO did have a house mother who was in the house at the time and she did escape. Fraternities at Ole Miss do have house mothers, but in my experience they pretty much kept out of the way and people were free to come and go. The basement area of the house was called the dungeon and it is not suprising 2 of the boys were killed there. It would be amazing if anyone got out of there. It just tears me up that these fires are so common and nothing has been done about it. I don't know how any fraternity can even get insured.
At Ole Miss alone since the 90's, there have been fires in the Phi Kappa Tau, Phi Delta Theta, and my own Zeta Tau Alpha houses, plus Crosby women's dorm. No one was killed in any of those fires, but students were displaced for months while expensive repairs were made. The Phi Tau house was completely destroyed and rebuilt just 3-4 years ago; it was the most recent fire.
There was a fraternity house fire at SMU, I believe it was Sig Ep, shortly before I attended there in the early 90's and I even witnessed a dorm fire at SMU. It was surreal. I was walking by on the sidewalk outside and there was fire coming out of a first floor window. I couldn't see anyone around anywhere. It was like a dream. I started screaming "fire, fire" and someone else finally came up and started yelling also. The people in the window above the fire opened their window and we yelled at them to get everyone out. They couldn't believe there was a fire right under them. Fortunately, people did begin to leisurely emerge from the building and someone called the fire department. The damage was minimal and no one was hurt. But I was so frustrated and angry to learn that someone had left a candle near long curtains, both of which were prohbited, and then left the room. What if I hadn't walked by? Two more minutes might have meant a much worse outcome. College students do not take fire safety seriously and their safety is not being enforced. I have that same impotent feeling once again now that members of my Ole Miss family have now been senselessly killed in a place where we all used to have fun. It is going to happen again and again until there are changes. There is such an obsession with hazing that all the terminolgy regarding sororoties and fraternities has been changed so no one's feelings get hurt, but the deadly threat of fire is ignored.
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