The University experienced a power outage caused by an electrical malfunction at the University’s substation in Tinton Falls on Thursday, Nov. 7 that lasted about 90 minutes.
According to Roger Gray, the Supervisor of Pressure Management and Transmission for NJ Natural Gas, a transformer blew and was defective for 40 minutes, causing Long Branch and West Long Branch to lose electricity.
Transformers are “electricial converters that change AC voltage to DC voltage in order to conduct electricity,” Gray said.
He explained that cold weather makes the transformer malfunctions to be at a higher level due to their susceptibility to corrosion.
The outage caused all 1 pm classes to be cancelled, while the University worked diligently to turn the campus electricity back on.
Patricia Swannack, Vice President for Administrative Services, said, “First, we determine which buildings are affected by the outage and dispatch Facilities Management employees to verify that no one is stuck in an elevator and shut off mechanical equipment so that if we experience power surges, equipment is not damaged.”
She continued, “At the same time, we are working with our JCP&L [the local electric company] representative to determine the cause of the outage and to attempt to learn when power will be restored.”
Swannack said whatever task the electricians, HVAC mechanics, office staff, and directors at the University are engaged in at the moment of the outage is stopped and refocused in order to deal with the power outage.
Mary Anne Nagy, Vice President for Student and Community Services, said the University has precautions in place to deal with power outages.
Nagy said, “When power goes out we have certain facilities that have generators to keep some of our systems working, like the dining hall, so we can try to continue normal operations.”
“We also have emergency lights in our buildings that will provide some temporary lighting for safety reasons,” Nagy added.
The University also has staff that is deployed to monitor safety and electrical situations. When a power outage occurs, Facilities Management and the Monmouth University Police Department (MUPD) execute operations to secure safety and productivity throughout campus and the surrounding community.
Bill McElrath, Chief of University Police, explained that safety policies were in place at the time of the outage and the University was fully informed of the situation.
McElrath said the blackout affected the campus and the surrounding community but overall, the situation was handled smoothly.
“On campus, there were some class cancellations due to the blackout. Off campus, the traffic lights in the affected area were out and local police departments had to assist with the flow of the traffic,” he said.
Some students were in class during the time of the outage. Most professors continued their lectures, working with the resources that were still available.
Mary Harris, specialist professor in the communication department, was teaching her Social Media in Public Relations class at the time of the outage. “As a class we tried to embrace the circumstances and utilized our smart phones to discuss the latest tweets and posts regarding the power outage,” said Harris.
“We also shared input regarding our digital world and how mobile social media allows us to access news and resources in just a few seconds. It is quite amazing,” Harris added.
Richard Scherl, associate professor in the computer science and software engineering department, also continued with his class lecture during his 11:30 am Introduction to Computer Science II class.
“Well, we were having a lab so generally the students would be working at their computers. I was just discussing, in general, how to go about doing the lab exercise when the power went out. So I just continued and we together developed the program from those generalized discussions, working entirely on the white board,” Scherl said.
A student in Scherl’s class expressed that everyone had acted as if the outage had not even occurred.
Jessica Anastasio, sophomore computer science major, said, “Since it was a computer science course all we did was start writing code on the whiteboard instead of on the computer. Neither the professor or the students made a big deal about it.”
After an hour and 30 minutes, power was back on.
“Eventually, JCP&L reset the breaker and we were back in business,” Swannack said.
PHOTO TAKEN by Cassandra Figueroa
