Outage traps 4 in campus elevators

By Kayloni Wyatt
Managing Editor
Hayley Burgess
News Editor
Nov. 12, 2009

People all over campus were cast into darkness Nov. 4 after the electrical utility power went out at approximately 9:30 a.m.

According to Progress Energy, the outage happened when a utility contractor working for Progress Energy accidentally struck a power line that serves the majority of the campus. This caused the power outage from where he was working within one mile of the UNCP campus.

“When one line goes down, they all go down,” said Larry Freeman, director of Facilities Operations.

The same contractor restored the power back to the campus nearly 30 minutes after it went off.

The Pinchbeck Maintenance Building, Village Apartments and Carter Hall, which houses the Division of Information Technology on campus, were the only three UNCP facilities unaffected by the power outage because their power source comes from a different grid.

Freeman said that all of the back-up systems kicked in automatically allowing people to get in and out of the buildings.

There were some people stuck in elevators during the power failure who had to wait for assistance.

Two people in Lumbee Hall were stuck in the elevator.

Campus police were called to both Pine and Oak Halls at 9:46 a.m. to unlock both elevators.

Since the outage, the elevator in Pine Hall has been functioning improperly. Two students were stuck in the elevator later that afternoon.

On Nov. 5, campus police were alerted to unlock the elevator in Pine Hall twice.

The facilities staff has keys and ways to open the elevator doors and began checking for people in elevators in different buildings around campus.

The power outage didn’t hinder the professors who were teaching.

“People in class started freaking out when it went out,” junior Amber Baldwin said. “Students thought school was going to be cancelled, but our professor wouldn’t let us go and just kept on teaching. He was showing PowerPoints, but when the power went out, he had to lecture for the rest of it.”

“This is very rare,” Freeman said. “It hardly ever happens.”