Water under the bridge

Walking around campus, you will undoubtedly come across multiple openings to the underground tunnels covered by a metal grating.

These grates are nothing more than air and access vents to the utility tunnel system holding piping, data, phone and power cables. Dawn Fellner, a junior in biology major, says she has a fear that these grates may one day give way while she is crossing them.

Her biggest fear, however, is crossing over grates she knows have water under them. It doesn’t matter the height, as long as there is water, Fellner says.

“It is a petrifying fear. I freeze up,” Fellner says.

Wherever Fellner walks she is conscious of any grates ahead of her path and she will always walk around them.

Small grates like sewer openings are to be avoided, but bridges with water under them are the absolute worst, she says.

Her first memory of this fear is from the age of 10 while in in the Flats of Cleveland with her family. There was a grated bridge crossing the Cuyahoga River and everyone was walking over it.
Everyone except Fellner, who was too terrified to cross.

“I don’t know why I have this fear. Nothing has ever really happened, but it freaked me out,” Fellner says. “Ever since then, I cannot do it.”

Occasionally she will accidentally find herself standing on top of a grated opening.

Fellner says that her fear of grates is not too severe because they usually can be avoided easily enough. But this is not always the case.

One of the worst encounters Fellner had with grates was on the Mantis ride at Cedar Point.

Approaching the ride, the stairs are all grated, but there was ground underneath, so Fellner says she was not as scared.

Getting off the ride, the grates were built above water, putting Fellner in a frightening situation.

“I froze and did not want to move,” she says. “But I had to because of people trying to get off the ride.”

For her to get off the ride, she says, her boyfriend at the time had to give her a piggyback ride to safety.

“My family and friends kind of think it’s silly and they just laugh at me,” Fellner says. “I mean it is kind of silly.

Fellner has no problems with water, she even water skis. Yet she still fears water underneath grates.

“I mean it really does not make any sense I guess,” Fellner admits. “I feel like a freak now.”