Bonfire or Blown Fuse: What was up with the smell at Friday’s basketball game?
Students and players wonder why the gym smelt of smoke and was filled with haze.
“What is that smell?” was the phrase floating around the gym on Friday, Dec. 1st. Parents and students began questioning why the air was getting smoky as the Bison Basketball team was playing Monticello.
During the game, fans noticed the air smelling of smoke as well as a growing fog as the game went on. It didn’t take long for people to wonder and ask what was going on and why the people in charge weren’t saying anything. People at the game were becoming concerned that it was something in the gym that was causing the smoke.
After a while, the arena announcer said that the smell was coming from bonfires happening in the neighborhoods surrounding the school. After the announcement was made, the student section started buzzing with speculations.
“My friend Hope Bjornson ‘25 said that it was really hard to breathe for her, since [the gym] was foggy and hazy,” Karsyn Zumbusch ‘25 said. “When we looked on our weather app, it said that the air quality was good outside.”
Besides fans in the stands, the smoke impacted the players who were expected to keep playing like nothing was going on.
“I could definitely feel [the smoke] in my lungs. It was kind of hard to breathe,” basketball player Nolan Mahannah ‘24 said. “I thought someone burnt popcorn at first.”
Even though the rumors of a fire in the school or a fuse blowing were put to an end by the announcement, that didn’t stop fans and the basketball team from wondering if that was the truth.
“I don’t really think a campfire would go into the school,” Mahannah said. “So maybe there was something, maybe there wasn’t.”
