Tyson Roehrkasse scans the beer cans, broken glass and discarded clothing as he searches the pool area for his missing bandana on Saturday, Aug. 27, 2011, after police broke up a large party in the Rams Point apartment complex in Fort Collins.
"There's no alcohol allowed in the pool area at all anymore," said Victoria Fox-Collis, leasing consultant with Campus Crossings at Ram's Pointe. "We keep the gates locked a lot of times now."
The apartment complex housing many Colorado State University students off-campus is full this year. But the annual back-to-school pool party that drew as many as 3,000 people and national attention with 10 hospitalizations and the arrests of two football players has been struck from the record. Its Facebook page was deleted, as well as all references to it from the Ram's Pointe page.
Brandan Vue, 20, of Firestone attended the Aug. 27, 2011 bash with some friends and took a video that tallied more than 180,000 YouTube views. He said it was an experience he won't forget.
"That's like the first time I ever had news companies emailing me," he said. "It was kind of cool, and we got interviewed for E! News."
The party in three hours filled the pool and apartment common area with thousands of young men and women in bathing suits, with many drinking alcohol and Red Bull while dancing to music. A triage area was later set up to deal with 15 medical incidents, mostly alcohol overdoses.
The event occurred the Saturday after the first week of CSU classes - a time early enough to draw students from schools with later start dates. Vue, who goes to school at Oregon State University, said he's back again this year to meet up with friends at Colorado back-to-school bashes before his own classes start in late September.
"A lot of my friends from Oregon were like, 'Whoa, what happened?' " he said. "I'm like, 'This is how we party in Colorado. That's how we do it out there.' "
Out of control
Fort Collins Police Services puts extra officers on party patrol each year during the start of fall classes and the end of spring finals. Last year, they knew about the Ram's Pointe pool party in advance.
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