This article will be updated as information is received.
One student has suffered a concussion after being hit by a piece of infrastructure which fell off the new Susan Wakil Building.
A witness says that around 4:30pm on Wednesday, the student was trying to close a door when the automatic closing mechanism, weighing roughly 2kg, fell onto their head.
The student blacked out and received a minor concussion, after which she was attended to by a first aid team and was taken to the nearby Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. The student has returned to campus and is still suffering from dizziness.
The new Susan Wakil Building, located on Western Avenue, was opened for the first time on February 26. The 8-storey building brings together USyd nursing, health sciences and medicine students onto the Camperdown campus.
Students in some Masters of Nursing lectures were briefly informed of the incident on Wednesday, with lecturers being asked to check if their students were okay.
Staff members have been asked to remind students that it was a new building, and to therefore take care and report faults.
However, the University responded with a comment stating the following:
“On Tuesday, a door closing mechanism on one of the doors in the Susan Wakil Health Building was dislodged from its mounting, and unfortunately fell onto a student.
The student was provided with first aid and then taken to hospital where they were given a CT scan; we understand no issues were found and they student did not suffer a concussion. They rested at home the following day, and we are continuing to check in and provide any support as needed.
Our subsequent examinations found that the door had been previously over-opened, pulling the mechanism mostly out of the door; this allowed a small action to completely dislodge it.
The mechanism has since been reinstalled, thoroughly inspected, and a door stopper drilled into the floor to prevent over-opening in future.
All other doors in the building have also since been inspected; this door was found to be unique to the building – it is a fire/emergency exit door that opens outward rather than into the seminar room – and so no other similar doors were found to have the same issue.”
This article was updated with the comment at 14:08 on Friday 5 March.
