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TEP error blacks out campus

A Tucson Electric Power accident caused a near campus-wide power outage for about 90 seconds last night, authorities said.

"We were doing some routine maintenance on the system and blew three transformers connected to the university," said TEP spokeswoman Wendy Erica Werden.

The outage occurred at 7:39 p.m. and lasted for about 90 seconds, Werden added.

The power outage tripped alarms across campus, said UAPD dispatcher Allison Casey.

"The power outage happened as an accident by TEP," Casey said. "It was pretty much across campus."

Werden said the problem was with a connection between the Tucson substation and the Irvington generating facility, but power was restored quickly as workers put the power back to its original source.

Erika Williams, a fine arts librarian who was working in the Main Library reference area, said the short outage "didn't seem to affect students too much.

About 100 students were working on library computers, but Williams said that although the printer stations had to be rebooted, no material was lost.

"It pretty much came and went," she said.

Students did experience computer problems across campus in the Engineering building computer lab.

"A couple people lost their documents," said lab monitor Scott Andrew Schulz, a communication senior.

Schulz added that about 30 people were working in the lab, mostly typing papers.

The power outage caused further problems for residents of Cochise Residence Hall, 1018 E. South Campus Dr.

The dorm was evacuated for about 20 minutes because of a fire alarm, a desk attendant said.

Trevor Brown, Memorial Student Union operations manager, said that although the information desk did not receive any calls about the outage, it did cause problems for one woman.

Brown said he saw a woman using an ATM machine on the east side of the union, and the machine took the woman's card when the power went out.