Trip Log: Trip 9
D., Snipe, and Snipe's friend met up at 1 AM and headed off to Lane Stadium with a goal of reaching the top of one of the two lighted towers.
We headed in through the tunnel onto the field. We successfully made it into the press room and away locker room, but the elevator that we had planned on using was turned off. We were unable to find accessible stairwells from the field side of Lane, so we exited through the tunnel.
After exiting, I pointed out the new locker room that was being constructed. We decided to explore it and started heading in that direction. On the way, we came across some ice that had been dumped on the grass in front of the Jamerson Athletic Center (the building located directly behind Cassell Coliseum) that had not melted yet. Someone had probably dumped it not too long ago, so we decided that it would be best if we did not explore the construction site and turned back.
We knew that in order to get to the roof, we would have to enter through the front of Lane Stadium so that we would have access to another elevator or a stairwell. Unfortunately, every door we tried was locked -- except one. This particular door has a light, that we originally thought might be a camera, above it. I tried the door first while covering my face with my hood and as I had hoped, it was open. I went in and waited for the others to follow.
I pushed the button for the elevator and it arrived just in time, but when we got in, it did not seem to allow us to take it to the sixth floor, which is the floor that would give us access to the roof. We ended up having to take the stairs instead. I noticed that a few of the floors were left unlocked, so we checked one out. There wasn't really anything of note; it was just a pretty standard box seating area, so we continued our journey.
Luckily the door to the fifth floor was also unlocked, so we climbed out onto the roof. We noticed that a door was left wide open; this door had a hallway in which there was a door to a boiler room. Unfortunately, the door was locked, so we weren't able to check it out.
After climbing out onto the roof, we had to pull ourselves onto the tower. There isn't a ladder, so we had to jump onto the indentations in the tower itself and pull ourselves up. After we had all made it up onto the tower, we opened the door to the unlocked elevator machine room and went in. There was a ladder in the back leading up to an unlocked roof hatch.
We spent a little while on the roof taking pictures and relaxing, then climbed back down the ladder, making sure to shut the roof hatch behind us. Fortunately, the elevator machine room has a door that opens out into a stairwell, so getting down wasn't nearly as difficult as getting up to the tower.
This was a pretty interesting exploration and was definitely worthwhile.
-Fuse
