We’re flying home on Tuesday, just a couple of days ahead of a “reunion weekend” planned by our alma mater, Whitman College.

Getting out of Dodge just in time, it appears.

The Marcus Whitman Hotel and Conference Center, the largest and most prominent of the hotels here in Walla Walla, was suddenly closed and evacuated last Friday due to chemical odors in the basement. The parking lots are empty, the hotel entrances locked and secured by yellow security tape.

Over the weekend, pure gasoline was found in a 10-foot sump in the hotel basement. Apparently the gasoline somehow migrated from a service station across the street into the hotel basement, although the two locations are not connected by any pipeline or drain, and it isn’t known how the gasoline made its way across the street.

Now, according to the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin, there is a two-pronged effort underway to remove gasoline from the hotel basement, and empty the tank at the service station so that the process of locating the leak can proceed. The UB’s story does note that they still have to find a contractor for the leak detection.

So far, there is no estimate of how long the hotel will have to remain empty while the volatile gasoline is removed and the area determined to be safe.

It now appears likely that anyone who booked one of the hotel’s 133 rooms will have to find accommodations elsewhere. That may not be easy, nor will the alternative digs provide the ambiance of the Marc.

I imagine there’s a lot of anxiety in the administrative offices over at the college today!