Written by: Marcus Nicholson
Three weeks later, many in the University of Akron community are still wondering about the odd timing of the August 30th power outage.
Many saw it as a coincidence that the outage occurred the same night as the first football game of the season. Others saw it as a way to get more attendance at the game against the University of Central Florida.
“We have 47 backup generators, and I have no idea why the power went out at Polsky,” said Wayne Jarvis, worker for the Physical Facilities Operation Center.
According to Joshua Carpenter, a surveying and mapping major, “It happened suddenly, right in the middle of class, when a student got a text that said class was canceled. All I could think about was how everyone said that they were going to the football game that day.”
A staff member at Bierce Library said, “They announced we were closing three times. Then, we get a call that says we’re staying open so that students have somewhere to go. I was wondering why we were even closing in the first place, because we had power.”
The staff member at Bierce Library had a theory that they wanted the workers to leave so they could use the parking spaces, because parking for a game is $10.
Amanda Hepfner, a third-year nursing student, was in the Learning Research Center in Mary Gladwin Hall when the outage happened.
“I was studying when I was interrupted by a text message that said the power was out, so class would be canceled,” Hepfner said.
Hepfner also said she thought it was weird that they mentioned that the football game would still be played.
“As I understand it, a transformer failed,” said UA president Luis Proenza. “The worry, at the time, was that it almost tripped the power to the stadium. Perhaps you can say it was an unfortunate, but happy, coincidence.”
But Proenza said they are unaware of how students with cancelled class that night decided to spend their night.
“We have no idea how many of the students (whose classes were canceled) chose to go to the game,” he said.
