Two hour blackout strands students, leaves campus in the dark

Anita Varma News Editor

Students in dorms woke up to flashing lights and noises of computers shutting down on the night of Wednesday, March 23. The College lost power at 1:57 a.m. A security report reported that the blackout was “due to the weather.” Parts of Poughkeepsie also lost power.

According to Director of Security Don Marsala, who received information from Buildings and Grounds, the problem with the power arose because one of Central Hudson’s sub-stations malfunctioned. Central Hudson is a company that supplies electric power to Vassar. “It was an outside event, so to speak,” said Marsala.

While some students slept through the 110-minute blackout, other students were locked out of their dorms, and some were stuck in elevators.

Students who were out of their dorms could not re-enter because the card swipe system cannot function without electricity.

Four students were stuck in an elevator in Main Building. RK Walker ’07 explained that the emergency call button in the elevator did not work, and there was no emergency phone.

“We pushed the emergency call button at least 20 times. Still, we got no response,” said Walker.

Students in the elevator called to someone outside the elevator, who went to the Campus Response Center. Security, a Buildings and Grounds troubleshooter, and the Arlington Fire Department responded to the elevator situation.

The elevator was stuck between the second and third floors. “They discovered that the emergency latch which opens the elevator door was broken on the third floor, though it apparently does work for the second and fourth,” said Walker. “The elevator could not be moved to one of those floors, however, due to the breaks which kick in when the power cuts out.”

Finally, the responders opened the elevator door and a security guard helped the students out of the elevator with a ladder.

“A request has been made to have an emergency phone installed in the Main elevator,” said Buildings and Grounds Director of Facility Operations Kiki Williams. “Our elevator contractor, Ferenis and Campus Communication has been advised that is is critical to have this phone installed.”

Meanwhile, other students congregated in hallways of the dorms and waited for the power to come back on. While some students talked about the possibility of classes being canceled for Thursday if the power did not return, the power did come back on at 3:20 a.m.

Marsala noted that security officers and Buildings and Grounds responded to the blackout. “Officers went around to all the different dorms to make sure the emergency lights went on,” he said.

Emergency lights offered a dull light source in dorm halls. Students also used flashlights to navigate through the hallways.

“Since the problem was external to Vassar, our electrians did not participate in correcting the problem,” said Williams. “They did however, ensure that emergency generators at Jewett, Olmstead, Mudd, Walker, Blodgett, Loeb, ACDC and the Boiler House were up and running to maintain critical building systems.”

After the blackout, many students thought that the loss of power was due to a heavy snow breaking power lines on campus. However, Williams said that the weather was not the reason for the blackout. “Although there were many large tree limbs that went down due to the heavy wet snow, [power lines on campus were] not the reason why power was lost,” she said. Power went out due to the weather, but not because of broken power lines at Vassar.

Marsala said the blackout did not cause as many problems as it might have if it had happened on another night. He said, “If it had happened at 11 p.m. on a Friday night, that would have been a different story.”