More than 100 students who were assigned to the Northeast building at Longwood Landings in downtown Farmville have been reassigned to other housing after lightning struck the building, causing an eight-alarm fire Monday night.

The incident came as Longwood University prepares to begin classes next week. Some students, including athletes and resident assistants, had already moved in.

According to Longwood University spokesman Matt McWilliams, 102 students have been reassigned to other housing.

Monday night, officials evacuated 60 people from the four buildings making up the Landings, 33 from the building struck by lightning.

“So they were immediately evacuated and displaced,” McWilliams said of those students, adding they are now in a mix of off-campus and university-managed housing. “We have enough space to find them housing.”

McWilliams said he did not have a “price tag” on the damages.

“I will say the fire was contained to the attic in the upper-floor area,” he said. “The rest of the building suffered some varying degrees of water damage from what we had to do to extinguish the fire. There’s water damage on throughout the rest in varying degrees.”

The incident closed the Barnes and Noble Bookstore, McWilliams said, which should reopen soon in anticipation of the thousands of students returning to Longwood.

The Longwood-managed apartments will be closed until repairs can be made, McWilliams said.

“We don’t know yet. I hesitate to put a timeline on them,” he said of reopening the top three floors of the building. “So, the second floor suffered less damage than the fourth floor.”

Farmville Volunteer Fire Department Chief Andrew Goss said there is a hole in the roof and some water damage.

“The upper floor has the most water damage,” Goss said. “I haven’t heard an exact report from the fire marshall, but I feel relatively comfortable telling you it was a lightning strike that caused it.”

Goss said firefighters used an estimated 20,000-25,000 gallons of water during the incident. About 60 volunteer firefighters responded and remained on the scene until about 2 a.m. Tuesday, he said.

“We’re hoping to get them back into their Landings apartments as soon as we can,” McWilliams said of the displaced students. “Obviously, there’s still a lot of assessing that needs to be done.”

Right now, Longwood University’s priority is the bookstore, he said, wanting to open it “as quickly as we can” since students will need to buy books.

Not only did the lightning cause the fire, but it disabled the building’s alarm system.

“The lightning sent a surge through the alarm system that basically blew the whole thing out,” McWilliams said.

The outage summoned officers with the Longwood University Police Department.

“The police officers were over there checking that out. They responded quickly to that. Then they smelled smoke,” McWilliams said.

Longwood plans to examine how it can mitigate unanticipated alarm system issues.

Among the eight responding fire companies was Blackstone Volunteer Fire Department, which brought a ladder truck. Prince Edward Volunteer Rescue Squad also responded.

“I thank all of the fire departments and the emergency crews who assisted. They saved the building from total destruction and they were quick and they were fast and they were really good,” McWilliams said.

Goss said he was not only “very, very happy” with Farmville’s response, but the response from the entire county, including Blackstone.

“Everyone worked really well together,” he said. “It was very effective having all those people together … It was very nice to see all the companies come together like that.”

McWilliams credited Officer Billy Shular and Sgt. Walter Whitt with the Longwood Police Department, for acting “really and truly heroically.”

He said the two “literally … evacuated the whole building themselves … They were the first on the scene. They smelled the smoke. They got everybody out of there … They deserve a lot of credit.”