BLACKSBURG — About 2,000 Virginia Tech students gathered on campus Tuesday night for a candlelight vigil to comfort the friends of three fellow Hokies who died this month.

German and international studies major Bryan Baugh, 20, died March 7 in his dormitory room after complaining to friends that he felt ill.

Business information technology major Sami Ullah, 22, of Leesburg died March 10 in a car crash in Arlington County.

And 18-year-old Sarah Dugas, a political science major from Virginia Beach, died at home on March 16.

Despite a cold wind that whipped across the Drillfield, friends of the three came to eulogize them, and strangers came by the hundreds to support the mourners.

Nick Tibbetts, a 21-year-old Air Force Cadet, said he volunteered to help with the event after finding it on Facebook. A vigil in the wake of tragic losses “just brings the community together,” he said.

“I was glad to help out. Ut prosim is a lifestyle here,” Tibbetts said, referencing the university’s Latin motto, which means “that I may serve.”

Friends of the three deceased students hugged and talked before the vigil, which began at 8 p.m. in front of the War Memorial Chapel.

Iman Ghanizada, told the assembly about Ullah’s positive outlook and deep faith and encouraged the group to be inspired by that example.

Of his college roommate and friend since middle school, Ghanizada said Ullah “carried a positive vibe with him. Wherever he went, he made you happy.

“It was very unfortunate to lose him, but he would want us to be happy,” Ghanizada said.

Lauren Anderson read a poem she wrote for Baugh, her close friend and fellow TechNotes singer.

“I wish I had been there,” Anderson read. “I wish someone was there for you, because you were always there for me.

“I asked God to make you my guardian angel,” Anderson read. “My fabulous rainbow glitter angel.”

Chris Brown, who said he knew Dugas from Frank W. Cox High School in Virginia Beach, recalled how she was “one of the most social, happy and outgoing people you could ever meet. She had an amazing ability to make friends. She was a beam of sunshine.”

After the eulogies, the three speakers lit memorial candles for their friends and then lit candles in the crowd.

Although the vigil was a student-led effort, administrators from the campus counseling center and the student affairs office attended the vigil.

“The Virginia Tech community feels a tremendous sense of loss and sadness each time a student of ours dies,” university spokesman Mark Owczarski wrote in a statement Tuesday.

Owczarski also wrote that the university would reach out to the families of the deceased and offer support to students who knew them.

None of the deaths were related, and according to police in each case, none of the students died under suspicious circumstances.

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