A number of students were sickened by bleach in a noninventory cleaning product used in a gender-neutral bathroom on the third floor of the Village A House last Monday afternoon, according to affected students and Director of Facilities Services Peter Baker in an e-mail to the Justice.Baker wrote that he learned late Tuesday morning that custodial supervision staff had responded to a call on Monday evening "and found an odor of bleach and a non-inventory cleaning product . that contained bleach." He wrote that Office of Facilities Services does not "purchase or use bleach when cleaning."

"Not surprisingly, we are seeing more and more non-inventory cleaning products and sanitizers around campus as a result of flu concerns," Baker wrote. "Our custodial staff will be reminded to be aware of these products and that extra care needs to be exercised to prevent the mixing of incompatible cleaning materials, University-supplied or not."

Amanda Bellmar '11 said, "I was studying in the common room, and I went into the gender-neutral bathroom to get a tissue, and immediately my eyes started to water, and I held my breath, and I ran out of there because the smell was so strong." She said that her community advisor went in afterward and subsequently threw up due to the smell. The CA, the community development coordinator and the Director of Residence Life declined to comment.

"The smell was extremely strong. When I went into the bathroom I got all teary eyed and nauseous. I immediately went to find another shower on the floor," Laura Velez '11 wrote in an e-mail to the Justice.

"I know a lot of us were unable to be out in the common room for a while because we had to prop open the door of the bathroom to let the smell come out because there was no ventilation in there, no window or anything," Bellmar added.

Bellmar said her CA had difficulty getting in touch with the University administration regarding the incident. "I know that my CA had to be very persistent to her advisers about the situation in order to get a response. . We didn't get a response until maybe the next afternoon after the incident occurred, 24 hours later," she said.

"The incident definitely made me uncomfortable. I really don't think it was appropriate that they took so long to respond, especially [since] we didn't know what the chemical was that was causing the nausea. . We didn't have the adequate resources to deal with the problem ourselves, so all we could do was prop the bathroom door open and try to get the smell to linger out of the bathroom," Bellmar said.

Vice President for Campus Operations Mark Collins wrote that Facilities Services consulted with Andrew Finn, the University manager of health and safety, about the incident. The students who were interviewed said that they did not go to the Health Center. Finn could not be reached for comment by press time.

Baker wrote that when he first heard about the incident early Tuesday morning, staff visited the location and the custodial supply room and found no products containing bleach.