WPCNR THE POWER NEWS.By John F. Bailey. March 17, 2009 UPDATED March 18, 2009 9:30 A.M. E.D.T.: The Superintendent of Schools office reports this morning that School District computers are now up and running thorughout the district, and electric power has been restored to the high school after Tuesday’s power outage.
The North Street Community, owners of the 311 North Street property in a statement today attributed the cause of the White Plains High School power outage Tuesday morning to a mystery wire not shown on any Con Edison, Verizon or Cablevision utility maps. In a statement issued today to WPCNR from Geoffrey Thompson, spokesperson for the organization, North Street Community reports:
With regard to today’s electrical outage, the problem occurred when workers renovating the Westchester Medical Pavilion (311 North Street) were removing old, unused utility wiring where a new courtyard is being created. All utility lines on the property have been carefully traced by North Street’s engineers and by Con Edison, Verizon and Cablevision well in advance of the commencement of any construction work. The line that caused the problem dates back at least 50 years and was not shown on any utility maps of the property. When contact was made with the live line, it caused a short that ran back through the line to the street and resulted in the service interruption that affected surrounding properties. Ironically, power was not lost at the North Street site.
As of 4:30 P.M. yesterday, the high school power had been restored, according to informed sources, however the computer server which stages the complete City School District computer network has not been restored to service. This morning Wednesday the computers are back in service. Superintendent of Schools Timothy Connors said Tuesday that the short circuit blew the transformers serving the high school, causing the power-out.
Persons experiencing the high school power down at 10:35 A.M. Tuesday told WPCNR “lights went on and off, then everything went dead.” They said there was no phone service, no e-mail, “nothing.”