In the late morning of November 13, 1936, the campus was shaken by a natural gas explosion at Whitehurst Hall. Four individuals were hospitalized after the blast ripped a six-inch-thick concrete floor above an underground tunnel. As a result of the blast, new state laws were passed that required all gas lines enter a building above ground and that an odor had to be added to natural gas to help detect leaks. Renovation work on the building included the addition of a fourth floor in 1937.