A correction was added to this article on July 20, 2004

Due to an editing error, the July 15 article ‘ISU police arrest three near steam tunnels’ had a misleading headline. None of the three students apprehended July 13 leaving the ISU steam tunnel system were arrested; all were charged with criminal trespass.

Due to a reporting error, the article also incorrectly attributed a comment to ISU Police Capt. Gene Deisinger. The remark ‘The compulsion for people to enter the dark recesses of the access tunnels is apparently a strong one’ should not have been attributed to a source. Deisinger did not make that remark. The Daily regrets the errors.

They came from beneath the campus.

ISU Police apprehended three students Tuesday as they emerged from the subterranean access tunnels that run beneath the campus after an alarm set off at one of the tunnels’ access points reported an intrusion.

Grant Blythe, 20, junior in electrical engineering, Dustin McCann, 22, senior in health and human performance, and William McGowan, 21, junior in pre-business, were met by officers as they exited the tunnel near the Palmer Building. They were charged with criminal trespassing and released.

“We were playing hide-and-go-seek,” McCann said when asked what the three were doing in the tunnels.

ISU Police Capt. Gene Deisinger said the three admitted to having been in the tunnels when questioned by police.

The compulsion for people to enter the dark recesses of the access tunnels is apparently a strong one, Deisinger said, as trespassing into the structures has been a somewhat continuous issue for police.

“It’s a fairly regular problem,” Deisinger said. “But security has improved significantly over the years.”

In January, Walker Pett, 18, and Gray Gideon, 19, both of Ames, were charged with criminal trespass after police responded to two alarms at the tunnel system near the Forker Building. Police found that the sensors near the entrance had been covered with tape.

Deisinger said many of the access areas to the tunnels are now equipped with alarms set to notify police if anyone sets foot inside them.

Jeff Witt, assistant director of utilities, said the tunnels represent a significant danger to would-be explorers. Contained within the 4.5 miles of tunnel are pipes which carry steam, compressed air and water.

The tunnels seem to have gained notoriety in speleology, or cave exploring, circles and amateur exploration. Several Web sites feature discussions on expeditions into the tunnels.