Physical plant workers were able to quickly remedy a blackout that took away the power of seven University of Wisconsin’s campus buildings Tuesday afternoon.
University Communications received the first reports of a loss of power in the Law School building, according to UW spokesperson Susannah Brooks.
As of 2:30 p.m. Tuesday, Brooks said the six campus buildings that completely lost power included the Law School building, Chamberlin Hall, Van Hise Hall, the Service Building, the Service Annex connected to the UW Service Building, Science Hall and the Bradley Memorial Building.
Sterling Hall, the seventh building affected during the blackout, maintained half of its power while the other half of the building had lost its power.
All seven buildings lost their power due to a switch gear equipment failure in the campus electrical system, Brooks said. She said University Communications issued a message regarding the power outage on the UW homepage.
Brooks said she contacted Faramarz Vakili, associate director of the UW Physical Plant, shortly before 2:30 p.m., which was just before University Communications issued a campuswide message with information about the blackout. She said Vakili’s office was in the UW Service Building that was affected by the blackout.
When University Communications issued the initial message notifying campus of the blackout, Brooks said six of the affected buildings were expected to regain their power by 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.
University Commutations issued a second message just before 3:30 p.m. stating that power had been restored in six of the seven campus buildings affected by the blackout.
The Bradley Memorial building is expected to regain power by tomorrow, according to Brooks. She said this solution was expected at the time she left the communications office.
“At the time we left, the estimate was that the Bradley Building would regain power by tomorrow,” Brooks said.
Brooks said she could not say for sure if the blackout had any impact on classes occurring in the buildings that lost power. But, she said she would guess that classes were affected Tuesday as a result of the blackout.
Vakili did not respond to a request to comment.
