Mines Block Party Ends when Students Level Hoover Street

Last weekend, a block party thrown by Colorado School of Mines students ended in a way no one could have predicted. The large party drew almost 150 students from Mines to the quiet Hoover Street neighborhood. The gathering started peacefully, but complaints, numbering in the teens, started pouring into the Golden Police department when the group began violating noise ordinances. Though it is too early to say for certain, according to eye-witness reports these noise violations stemmed from intense arguments over which major was the best. Video from just before the Golden Police department arrived seems to support this as one party-goer can be heard saying, “Geology rules.”

First and only to the scene, Officer Newton was quoted saying, “When I politely asked the students to stop making so much noise the tension in the air was electrifying.” What happened next was truly unexpected. According to Officer Newton, “It was horrible to witness. You hear stories about mob mentality, but nothing could have prepared me for what was about to happen.” Police reports detail a sudden shift in the tone of the crowd as a group of physics majors rushed Newton’s squad car. Once they had surrounded it, they began drawing free body diagrams on the hood of the vehicle. It was at this point chaos truly erupted on sleepy Hoover Street.

One resident, who wished not to be named for her safety, told The Oredigger, “I went over to my window to see what the commotion was, and saw strangers were rooting around in my yard and shouting.”

According to the Police report, this was the work of a group of rouge geologists that prowled the street looking for different rocks to classify. Before Officer Newton could stop either the physicists or geologists, a group of chemical engineers surrounded him, insisting that he hand over a canister of pepper spray so they could use it in a liquid-liquid extraction experiment. Unsure what they were talking about, and worried that things would continue to escalate further until he found himself struck by the questions of CompSci majors on his views of robotics ethics, Newton reached for his radio to call for backup.

What stopped him from making that call was a large cracking sound he heard to his right. Newton recalled, “I wasn’t sure what to expect. I was really out of my element at that point.” Although not clear at the time, that sound was caused by a group of civil engineers. Noticing that the 89 Hover Street was unlevel, they set out to fix it. With a series of calculations performed on the back of cocktail napkins, currently being held as evidence, they had formulated their plan. Their calculations showed that, by using the bottle jacks from a number of their cars, they could safely raise a portion of the house to make it level. Newton recalls the homeowners were initially frightened, but when they realized the free home repair they were receiving, they began cheering the students on.

Just as it seemed something even more dramatic might be about to happen, the students peacefully began to filter out of the area. Relieved, Newton checked his watch and realized that it was time for the streetlight at the intersection of 19th and Jackson to start flashing red. It seems that this subconsciously caused the Mines students to know it was time to go home. The day after this block party went nerdy, graphing paper and TI-30XIIS calculators still littered the street. Time will only tell what punishment, if any, these students will face. •