Rope swings outside admin building removed due to safety issues

The swings were taken down despite being promoted on FAU’s official Instagram.

Photo+courtesy+of+twitter+user+Noah+Brown.+

Photo courtesy of twitter user Noah Brown.

Ryan Lynch, Business Manager

A trio of swings placed on the tree outside of the Administration Building on the Boca campus have been removed by FAU due to safety issues.

The rope swings were placed in the area by an unknown individual and were spread among the picnic tables.

Artie Harrison, the risk manager for FAU’s Environmental Health and Safety Department, said via email, “The swings can be dangerous as the strength of the individual limbs is unknown which could lead to a broken limb and a falling incident.”

Noah Brown, a junior urban planning major, first noticed the swings on April 5 and 6.

“I’ve also been told hammocks are not allowed in the tree as well. There used to be a group of students who hung them high in the branches, and there were students like me who hung them lower in the tree and other areas on campus,” he said.

Brown said he thought it was strange the school promoted the swings in an April 7 Instagram post despite the fact that they took them down afterward.

“Where are the swings? Why are they gone?” Instagram user MegahMichael_ commented. “We are upset. @kfk2310 @wesculbreath.”

Instapost:

It’s FriYAY! 🎉 #FAU

A post shared by Florida Atlantic University (@floridaatlantic) on

According to Harrison, the swings are in violation of the Student Code of Conduct’s section 5(b), which states that any altercation that includes “Theft, conversion, misuse, damage, defacing or destruction of University property or of the property of members of the University community,” can be considered a violation.

Harrison wrote that the swings were taken down by members of Physical Plant, an FAU division that handles maintenance issues on campus.

The University Press reached out to FAU police about the legality of the swings and if they saw them as unsafe, but did not receive a response as of publication time.

Ryan Lynch is the business manager of the University Press. For information regarding this or other stories, email [email protected] or tweet him @RyanLynchwriter.