DANIEL WONG/ Daily Bruin Senior Staff UCLA students,
faculty and staff workers gather at the Cooparage in Ackerman to
find out the latest news about the Terrorist Attacks in New York
and Washington D.C..
By Marcelle Richards
Daily Bruin Senior Staff
The suicide plane attacks may have been 3,000 miles away, but
the impact on UCLA and its community couldn’t have struck
closer to home.
While all University of California campuses will remain in
operation, precautions have been taken in the small chance a
disaster hits, said Chancellor Albert Carnesale.
“Our intention is to try to operate the campus as normally
as possible,” he said. “There is no indication of any
threat beyond Washington and New York but during times like this,
there’s a need to be more vigilant and cautious.”
University police were deployed to the corners of Westwood and
the LAPD asked law enforcement agencies to send out all units,
including detective and anti-terrorist divisions.
 DANIEL WONG/ Daily Bruin Senior Staff The usually crowded
steps before the College Library was nearly empty on Monday
morning. A suspicious car in Lot 32 and a package in the James West
Alumni Center elicited responses from UCPD, though no problems were
found with either.
Despite heightened senses, the campus seemed gravely empty. Most
were home, watching television or calling friends and family.
“This is a new type of war and we don’t know who our
enemy is,” said political science professor Michael
Intriligator.
Fourth-year physiological sciences student Christopher Young
first found out about the situation when he saw the World Trade
Center go up in flames on his TV screen.
After a phone call from his boss to say that no one else was
going to work, he spent his time at home trying to call his mother
in Paris.
“I really don’t know how to react,” he
said.
On campus, offices remained empty and labs stayed locked.
Administrators in Murphy Hall scrambled to decide what UCLA would
do as the fate of Los Angeles and the nation remained uncertain in
the initial moments.
Shirt sleeves were rolled up, jackets shed and ties loosened as
Carnesale and his team of nine vice chancellors feverishly worked
to handle the situation at hand.
 DANIEL WONG/ Daily Bruin Senior Staff UCLA students,
faculty and staff workers gather at the Cooparage in Ackerman to
find out the latest news about the Terrorist Attacks in New York
and Washington D.C..
The chancellor issued a statement at 8:30 a.m. and later met
with emergency teams and other administrators.
Cancelled flights accounted for a range of event cancellations,
including all Pac-10 games this weekend and the UC Regents meeting
scheduled for today and Thursday.
The Medical Center was immediately put on “code
yellow” alert, the stage of anticipation for an emergency. An
inventory of hospital beds, operating rooms and equipment was taken
in expectation that they might be used.
Medical Center director Michael Karpf sent three notices to
advise hospital administration of staffing procedures. The staff
were to remain on-duty until told otherwise.
At noon, when initial fears of a disaster in the immediate area
subsided, Karpf sent a third e-mail to advise the staff to resume
normal schedules.
Though the hospital dropped its “code yellow” status
at 2:30 p.m., physicians, nurses and other hospital staff were
on-call.
Meanwhile, other parts of campus took matters into their own
hands.
The history department closed Tuesday, as did the School of
Public Policy and the departments of international studies and
development, comparative literature, physiological science,
political science, economics, French, Italian and Germanic
languages.
Phones went unanswered in nearly all remaining departments. All
classes in the closed departments were cancelled.
Third-year history and communications student Jennifer Cecil
stepped on campus expecting to hear a lecture on the First
Continental Congress.
But the lecture was canceled. The professor wasn’t
emotionally prepared to deliver it, nor was anyone prepared to
focus on it, Cecil said.
The College of Letters & Science was unaware which
departments had closed for the day, but Harlan Lebo, director of
Letters & Science Communications, expects departments will
reopen today.
But some weren’t given the choice to work or not.
Medical Center employees mourned during services in the hospital
while working on the clock. Facilities Management employees were
also required to work.
“We are in business usually even if there had been a
critical threat to UCLA,” said Gail Cowling, executive
officer of Facilities Management. “Our staff would have been
required to come in.”
At 4 p.m., Carnesale called a second executive meeting. They
concluded that psychological services should be made available and
the Medical Center should continue the blood drive.
“We’re certainly keeping on top of the situation
every way that we can, taking all the precautions that we can,
providing services to the members of our community,”
Carnesale said.
Psychological services are available at 4223
Mathematical-Sciences Building and Center for Health Sciences
A3-062.
With reports from Andy Garcia, Rachel Makabi, Amber Noizumi and
Scott Schultz, Daily Bruin Senior Staff.