Bars closed due to lack of coronavirus precautions

Bars closed due to lack of coronavirus precautions

We begin tonight with the latest coronavirus information you need to know!

The university of alabama confirms testing revealed 566 cases of coronavirus across all its campuses since august 19th.

Eight are here in huntsville at u-a-h.

531 are at the main campus in tuscaloosa.

Earlier today the university and city leaders decided something had to change.

And this is why...packed bars, people without masks and no social distancing.

Today -- the city shut down bars for two weeks!

Thank you for joining us tonight -- i'm dan shaffer.

And i'm najahe sherman the waay 31 i-team spent the weekend in tuscaloosa and can show you the reason behind the decision.

Waay 31's casey albritton joins us now after getting a look inside the bars for herself.

This is just some of what i saw.

It was a mixed bag.

Some bars followed the guidelines in place over the weekend.

Others didn't and it's why they're all closed now.

One bar was so crowded, and so few people wearing masks, we needed to leave because it didn't seem safe.

9 p-m--typically pretty early for bars to be this packed...but at a bar called twelve twenty five in tuscaloosa... this was what it looked like... but let's rewind to the start of our journey at the university of alabama started.

At 3:30 p-m, our executive producer and i arrived on campus.

We saw these signs everywhere-- asking students to social distance and wear masks.

We barely saw any students on the quad or along greek row - but everyone we did see was wore masks and stayed in groups.

Overall it seemed safe.

An hour later, we went to buffalo phil's.

The restaurant and bar along the tuscaloosa strip forced customers to wait in line outside and staff made sure we kept our distance.

Once we sat down - staff was always in masks.

Customers put theirs on when they left their tables.

Next up, a bar called the bear trap.

It was one of the bars from viral pictures taken the prior weekend.

But this week - it looked much different.

It's the only spot we saw a police officer!

People stayed in groups and security told students to social distance.

As we left at 7pm, we walked by this line leading into the bear trap.

You can hear the bouncer yelling --telling everyone to keep their masks on.

They were so strict with capacity - we never got back in.

Then it was a bar we heard students talking about.

At 8 p-m - we walked into an already crowded twelve twenty five.

When the crowd grew, staff removed tables and chairs to make more space for the bar.

As the night continued -- students continued to pile in.

Take a look at the line into the bar now... you can see some students wearing masks, but there was no social distancing.

This video was taken at 9:17 p-m... look closely.

There's no spacing --no one wearing face coverings--and people kept coming inside... here's another video from 9:23 p-m.

Lines of students waiting at the bar four people deep.

No masks in sight.

At this point, we decided to leave because it didn't seem safe.

We took this video outside - you can see 12 25 stood out...you don't see lines like that anywhere else.

Our last stop was gallette's...a bar that faced backlash because of these scenes the prior weekend.

No social distancing or masks... this weekend...it seemed the safest.

Signs lined the bar asking people to take precautions and you could see x's on the ground to show people where to stand.

They told us to leave promptly at 11 - and staff immediately started wiping down tables.

As we started to leave - we didn't see any tuscaloosa police or unviersity of alabama police officers.

We went back to greek row- it was eerily quiet and empty.

We spent roughly 8 hours on campus- and like i said, we only saw one police officer.

From our perspective - it appeared that enforcement of health orders fell on individual businesses, and some took it more seriously than others.

As of now, bars in tuscaloosa can reopen september 8th.

Restaurants can remain open dan?

Thanks casey.

Governor kay ivey released a statement in response to the order saying -- "if we do not act expeditiously, it leaves the potential for a situation to get out of hand, which would require even tougher, longer-lasting decisions to be enacted."