From: Tracy Erbeck <tracy@cs.washington.edu>
Date: Wed, Mar 14, 2012 at 3:44 PM
Subject: [cs-ugrads] the power outage
To: cs-staff – Mailing List <cs-staff@cs.washington.edu>, faculty – Mailing List <faculty@cs.washington.edu>, visitors – Mailing List <visitors@cs.washington.edu>, cs-grads@cs.washington.edu, cs-ugrads – Mailing List <cs-ugrads@cs.washington.edu>
Good times Wednesday with the power outage! I’d like to thank everybody for being cooperative and understanding.
Briefly, I’ve been told that Seattle City Light had two workers at the power station which feeds UW. There was a blunder, and UW (among many customers) ended up without regular power and without emergency power.
Many have asked why the emergency pathway lighting did not work. This was a surprise to me as well. The electricians explained that the building has two electrical feeds- one for daily operations, and one for emergency power. Rarely do both feeds go down at the same time, but they did (I’ve heard a number indicating it has been upwards of 15 years since this has happened to campus). While our card readers are on battery backup, our emergency lights are not.
A few changes will be made, in case this happens again. Most importantly- two battery backup lights will be installed in the lower level, the area of our building without natural light. And, all offices will be issued a glow stick to be used in an emergency (not a rave). There will likely be a few other changes, but these two are quick and easy to implement, and we’re proceeding immediately.
If you have any concerns about this, or the building, please feel free to email me directly.
Tracy Erbeck
Facilities Manager, CSE, University of Washington
206.543.9264 (office)
206.543.2969 (fax)