USF’s online database, Blackboard, was restored at 4:30 a.m. Monday.
A transformer glitch left most of the campus without power Sunday afternoon, and the backup generator that powers the Library server room failed, causing Blackboard to crash at 3 p.m. Sunday.
A transformer at a USF substation on Fletcher Avenue went down at around 1 p.m., causing much of the campus to lose power. The east side was hit harder, said University Police spokeswoman Lt. Meg Ross.
Tampa Electric Company (TECO) spokesman Rick Morera said transformer failures just happen sometimes.
The outage left the campus and 3,500 TECO customers in surrounding area without power for nearly two hours. Morera said many factors can determine the amount of time it takes to restore power.
“Each incident, you kind of have to look at it individually. … Sometimes you have the ability to route the electricity from a different direction, and resolving outages like that can be done fairly quick,” Morera said. “Sometimes it can almost be done from our central office. There are all kinds of different variables.”
– Kelli Polson
