A number of river Houses and other Harvard buildings suffered power outages yesterday afternoon, beginning around 4:45 p.m. and continuing for almost four hours.
The outages--which may have been caused by a power surge--were the most widespread in recent memory.
"This has never happened on this scale to my knowledge," said University spokesperson Joe Wrinn.
Wrinn said the DeWolfe housing complex, Eliot, Leverett, Mather and Quincy Houses all experienced some loss of power, as did the Kennedy School of Government, the Taubman Center and Rosovsky Hall.
Students also reported electrical problems at Kirkland and Winthrop Houses.
Wrinn said University crews first determined that the electric lines connecting the buildings were not damaged and, subsequently, went "building to building," flipping circuit breakers and restoring power.
"All power was on by 8:30," he said.
Wrinn said the outage most likely originated at the Holyoke Center, where a surge of electricity in one of the power grids might have sent each of the affected buildings more volts than their circuits could handle. The cause of the surge, he said, is unknown.
Read more in News
Callbacks Place Third in National CompetitionRecommended Articles
-
CAUTION: CONSTRUCTION IN PROGRESSHarvard will be home to more construction workers than students this summer as the University scrambles to renovate a number
-
Break In Water Pipe Sets Houses GurglingA broken pipe under Dunster St. near Kirkland House created a small flood and was raising havoc with the water
-
Fair, Monro Praise Idea Of House-Based ReunionsTwenty-fifth Reunion classes will someday return to live entirely in the Houses, Gordon M. Fair, Master of Dunster House, predicted
-
The Bevingtons of Moors HallWhen a young faculty couple took over the head residentship of Comstock Hall last fall, their arrival marked a sharp
-
Winthrop, Dunster Admit Most Transfer StudentsDunster and Winthrop Houses have admitted the highest number of transfer applicants this semester, accepting 14 and 12 students respectively,
-
Work to Begin May 1 On Eliot/K-House KitchenAfter nearly one year of ironing out wrinkles in the model, construction on a $500,000 kitchen to serve both," Kirkland
