Ava Knapp

The Palo Alto Fire Department arrives on scene due to fire alarms going off in the Palo Alto High School Performing Arts Center at 4:45 this afternoon. Eric Holm, Palo Alto Unified School District facilities director, said that the issue was due to smoke in the basement. “A motor on a pump was smoking, and we are still investigating the cause of that,” Holm said.

The Palo Alto Fire Department addressed a smoking motor that caused the fire alarm to go off at the Palo Alto High School Performing Arts Center, arriving at 4:45 p.m. this afternoon.

According to Eric Holm, the Palo Alto Unified School District’s facilities director, the cause of the fire alarm was caused from smoke and not a fire.

“A motor on a pump was smoking and we are still investigating the cause,” Holm said. “It’s a backup system in the basement. It was smoking because the outside of it was hot and overheated.”

Holm said that PAUSD has already called for a repair company to come look at and fix the issue.

“We checked it out, fire department checked it out and they have cleared us to turn off the fire alarms. The [repair] company will come check it out too.”

The issue in the PAC was unrelated to the faulty fire alarms that Palo Alto High School has experienced in the past, Holm said. The fire system will be discussed at the PAUSD board meeting at 6:30 this evening, according to Holm.

There was a delay of access to the PAC and students from Jane Lathrop Stanford middle school’s choir pops concert had to wait outside.

The choir concert will still take place at 7 to 8 p.m.

According to choir performer Isa Wu, the disruption doesn’t change her excitement for the performance.

“It’s just a minor inconvenience,” Wu said. “I am looking forward to this pops concert where we will perform popular and familiar songs.”