Power Protection FEATURED ARTICLE

A good old fashioned power disruption occurred at a near-by electric distribution company – specifically, due to the malfunctioning of an underground cable that runs throughout the city of New Haven.

Yale University – one of the nation’s most prestigious and historic educational institutions – has survived record-breaking hurricanes and snowstorms back in October 2012 and this past February; however, the college lost power for a full 80 minutes last night when United Illuminating Company, a New Haven-based regional electric company, experienced a major power disruption that affected Yale’s Central Power Plant.

At least according to the University’s VP, Linda Lorimer, that’s what happened. Putting the origins of this power outage aside, thousands of students went without lights, electricity and Internet service from approximately 6:25 to 7:45 PM. Affected areas of Yale’s campus included Old Campus; the 12 residential colleges; Swing Space; the Yale Law School; the Yale School of Architecture; the Yale School of Art; Bass Library; and Sterling Memorial Library. Thankfully, the Yale School of Medicine and the Yale-New Haven Hospital were unaffected.

While the power was restored before 8 PM, the blackout caused the university’s ITS servers to fail, which included the EliApps e-mail portal, which didn’t recover until around 10 PM, according to Yale Daily News.

Additionally, the outage also affected some of New Haven’s most populated and visited areas, such as Broadway and York street.

“Luckily, facilities was able to restore all power, but unfortunately, there was collateral damage as a result of the surge that affected our network,” Maria Bouffard, Yale director of emergency management, reportedly explained in an e-mail. “About 60 percent of the traffic on the Internet is operating. Yale University ITS is replacing equipment and hoping that it will be restored tonight. The Yale Police Department increased patrols in the area to maintain the same level of safety.”

This just goes to show that power outages aren’t completely associated with natural disasters or nature-related incidents. Sometimes, the culprit is just a good old fashioned power disruption.

To read the full report, click here.