By Rachel Hancock and Sylvia Hernandez
Power at the Brooks City-Base Campus went out this afternoon, caused by damage to a power line by an excavator, which led to the cancellation of evening classes.
Official notification of classes being canceled went out to students and employees via jaguar email and the emergency notification system at 4:45 p.m.
The email stated that no other campuses but Brooks Campus were affected by the outage. The email also advised students to await a follow-up message on when classes would resume.
Early reports from people on campus indicated that a piece of equipment used by a nearby construction crew may have fallen on power lines. University officials could not confirm the exact cause, but Marilu Reyna, associate vice president for University Communications, said she was awaiting word from the University Police Chief John Coleman as to whether an electrical line was actually damaged.
Later, Brooks Development Authority officials confirmed that a power line was hit by an excavator during a demolition project.
Expecting the outage to be temporary, many students and faculty remained in their classrooms awaiting further instruction. About 10 minutes later, word about possible class cancellations started to spread throughout the building and among students outside.
While waiting for official word from the University President Maria Hernandez Ferrier, students lingered in the hallways, many of them making phone calls trying to get more information.
At one point, Douglas Carter, assistant vice president for University Relations who also teaches at Brooks Campus, was approached by a reporter and said, “Power is down everywhere in the building. Calls have been made to CPS and the safety manager has informed the president.”
After students left the building, officials started to lock the facility and posted closure notices at all entrances.
Reporters then walked to the construction site where a crew was working in the rain despite the downed power line.
Don Jakeway, president and CEO of Brooks Developmental Authority said, “They are demolishing an old federal building here and the contractor hit a line. It knocked out power to the majority of the campus so we’re trying to get the assessment now.”
Another individual at the scene from the Brooks Development Authority, who did not want to be named, stated that he did not have the details of what happened but mentioned that an excavator operated by a demolition contractor contacted a wire that caused the outage. He also said BDA was awaiting arrival of a City Public Service worker to assess the problem.
Paul Chadwick, the CPS worker called to the site, arrived just before 5 p.m. After speaking with the crew, he spoke to reporters and confirmed that operator error caused the excavator to come into contact with the electrical line and pointed to the broken (but live) wire still lying across the pavement and road way. He also pointed to the sizeable burn marks left on the excavator as a result.
Just after 7 p.m., the University confirmed via phone and jaguar email that power had been restored at Brooks Campus and classes would resume Tuesday morning.
