At Least 150 Students Displaced Overnight After Adams House Fire

At least 150 students were forced out of their dorm rooms for several hours after an early Sunday morning fire in Adams House, leaving many scrambling for a place to stay overnight.

The Cambridge Fire Department responded to a fire alarm in Randolph Hall at 2:11 a.m., and arrived to find smoke billowing from a fourth-floor window. Within 30 minutes, firefighters — alongside the Harvard University Police Department — had shut down part of Mount Auburn Street and raised a ladder to reach the room.

Firefighters removed a mattress from the room that caught fire.

CFD and HUPD did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Students were ordered to evacuate as the response unfolded. Adams House tutors initially directed residents to wait in the dining hall, but by around 3 a.m., told displaced students to seek alternate housing while crews worked to clear the building, according to seven students.

Tomas C. Arroyo ’27, a third-floor Randolph resident, said tutors warned students they might not be able to return to their rooms for several hours.

“The tutors of Adams told us to go to the dhall to stay for the meanwhile, because it’s going to be for around three to four hours,” Arroyo said.

Sprinklers triggered by the fire sent water spilling into neighbouring rooms, including one next to Arroyo’s.

“They were getting some leaks from the fourth floor, probably from the sprinkler system,” Arroyo said of a nearby room.

As of 4 a.m., Adams House administrators had not provided an estimate for when students could return to Randolph Hall. No injuries were reported.

In a 10:12 a.m email, Adams House Faculty Dean Mercedes C. “Mercy” Becerra ’91 said students would be able to return to Randolph beginning at 10:30 a.m.

She wrote that most residents were cleared to reenter, though part of the building remained temporarily closed as crews worked to reset the fire system. A small number of dorm rooms were still off-limits, and she pledged to follow up directly with those residents with additional information.

Becerra also noted that no other Adams buildings were impacted and that there were no reported injuries.

This is a developing story and will be updated

—Staff writer Shawn A. Boehmer can be reached at [email protected] and on Signal at shawnb.18. Follow him on X @ShawnBoehmer.