OUR OPINION: While SG has done a good job in dealing with the forecasted cold Campout weather, more should have been done to plan for such an occurrence.
The low for Friday night is forecast in the teens and may reach single digits.
Unfortunately for students looking for a ticket to the home basketball game against UNC-Chapel Hill, these temperatures will be a fact of life during the outdoor Campout.
Student Government is looking to combat safety concerns, as students will be spending hours outdoors during the coldest hours of the night. Campout planners will be enforcing rules regarding proper attire, providing heaters around Lee Field to keep students warm and serving hot chocolate and pizza throughout the night.
Planners have done a decent job in quickly finding ways to ensure students remain safe during the frigid weather predicted for the Campout. But such a possibility should have been considered when first planning the event.
The Campout for tickets to the UNC-CH basketball game is a tradition and the mark of passionate fans of the men’s basketball team. Planners for future Campouts should consider factors like the possibility of inclement or unsafe weather conditions and take the proper steps to ensure students do not have to worry about safety or missing out on a tradition.
If conditions become severe enough, Campout organizers have plans in place to shut down the event early and send students home if the weather conditions become a safety risk.
Let us not forget: January is a winter month, and winter months tend to be colder than the rest of the year. There are no rules about which nights will be colder than normal, nor are there any regulations governing if extreme weather will coincide with outdoor traditions like Campout.
This is not to take away from the quick action and planning Campout organizers have taken to ensure students are safe and not extremely cold during the event. But there is no reason why the event’s planners did not anticipate the possibility of extreme cold weather and come up with alternative locations for Campout in the event of inclement weather.
Students will be miserable enough if they are unable to get tickets to one of the biggest basketball games of the season. There’s no reason why the students who get tickets should be miserable have to struggle to keep warm to compound that problem.
