“By the grace of God, no one is in London right now,” Ole Miss study abroad adviser Skip Langley said.
Conservative Member of Parliament Tobias Ellwood, centre, helps emergency services attend to an injured person outside the Houses of Parliament, London, Wednesday.
Wednesday morning, news spread about a terrorist attack in London when a knife-wielding man plowed a car into pedestrians on Westminster Bridge before fatally stabbing a police officer at the gates of Parliament. Four were killed, including the attacker, and about 40 others were injured, in what Prime Minister Theresa May called a “sick and depraved terrorist attack,” according to The Associated Press.
All the other students in the United Kingdom have been confirmed safe.
Langley, who oversees students in different regions including the United Kingdom, said this was the first time in his six-year tenure that no students were studying abroad in London.
In 2005, Langley was an Ole Miss student himself studying abroad in London. He was there when the July 7, 2005, London bombings happened. The bombings, a series of coordinated suicide bombings in public transportation, killed 52 people and injured hundreds.
“Some of those emotions I had then, I had again today when I got that alert,” Langley said.
He said risks like this are always in the back of his mind as a study abroad adviser, but the office does have a reaction plan to ensure everyone’s safety when it does happen.
The first people the office reaches out to in these situations are the people living directly in that area. Then, it continues to check with everyone nearby. He said people may not be simply studying in one specific city or country, as students travel all around for spring break and other occasions.
No students with the Study Abroad Office were directly affected by the attack. Two students, Lauren Vonder Haar and William Mayo, were in London at the time of the attack interning with Deloitte but have been confirmed safe.
The London incident, however, is not the first time the Study Abroad Office has had to react to an attack.
Cassie Porter, a student worker in the Study Abroad Office, was in Berlin last summer when two bombings happened south of her.
“The Study Abroad Office made sure that whenever there was a threat that happened near us, I got an email saying, ‘Hey, just so you know, this happened. Please send us an email and let us know that you are OK,’” Porter said.
Students are also required to attend an orientation before traveling abroad to discuss health and safety issues they may encounter in the different countries. The office recommends students take part in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program through the U.S. State Department, which alerts the embassies of the countries American citizens are in if a security emergency occurs.
According to a story map by the Esri Story Maps Team and PeaceTech Lab, there have been 293 attacks with 1,875 fatalities around the globe in 2017 already.
Attacks are reported regularly in the Middle East and Europe, including hot spots like France and Syria.
Due to the danger involved in traveling to places where terrorism is more commonplace, European countries have seen a decline in recent tourism trends. According to an article by The New York Times, this is especially true in France, following the November 2016 attack in Paris and the Bastille Day tragedy in Nice.
Porter said there has been a growing attitude of fear among students toward traveling to Europe.
“Some people kind of assume that anywhere they go in Europe, they are going to get attacked, which is not the case at all,” Porter said. She said once students speak with their advisers, they feel more comfortable about going abroad.
Porter said though she has not seen a decline in students studying abroad, there has been an uptick in calls from concerned parents.
“We have definitely had to talk about it more, but by the time we are done explaining [safety precautions and resources], they are usually pretty comfortable with the idea,” Porter said.
For some students, the consolation of the Study Abroad Office is not enough to gain the permission of their parents to go abroad.
Demi Leara, a junior pharmacy student, wanted to study abroad this summer in Spain but is not able to because of concerns from her parents about safety overseas.
“My parents are safety freaks, and they are too scared of letting me go out of the country without them,” Leara said.
For other students, the positive opportunities offered from immersion in a different culture outweigh the cons.
David Newman, a junior international studies major, is currently studying in Jordan for the semester.
Newman said right now is a risky time to be abroad in the Middle East, but he came to Ole Miss to study Arabic, and the opportunity is too good to pass up in what he considers the foundational years of learning a language.
“The best way to understand a complex region like the Middle East is to immerse yourself in it,” Newman said. “I think ignorance can often be just as, if not more, dangerous than traversing through Israel, Palestine and Jordan. In my mind, the benefits of studying abroad in the Middle East far outweigh the potential risks.”
This article was contributed to The Daily Mississippian from an advanced reporting class with additional reporting from Lana Ferguson.
