A series of fires and a manhole explosion led officials to shut down the campus and send students home early for spring break.

Texas Tech University sent students on an early spring break after spurts of green flames shot out from manholes on campus on Wednesday night. The source was an explosion at a substation that caused widespread outages across campus and the university's Health Sciences Center.

Authorities at Texas Tech University say an explosion inside a maintenance hole set off fires and power outages on the campus, leading school officials to issue evacuation orders for several buildings