Blackout Descends, Leaves 3000 in Dark

A power outage struck a large area of the Harvard campus last night, casting a shadow on the activities of some 3000 students in several River Houses, Freshman Dorms, Widener Library, and a variety of other buildings.

Facilities Maintenance officials said electricity went out at 7:46 p.m. Power was restored in some affected buildings about 90 minutes later, but full power did not return until 11:38 p.m., when electricity was restored to Mather Tower.

Jim Devito, a Facilities Maintenance field supervisor, said officials were uncertain as to the precise cause of the outage.

But, Devito said, officals "have not ruled out" a variety of possibilities, including water damage and aging wiring.

A spokesman for the Cambridge Electric Co., which supplies electricity to the University, said "it was an internal problem for Harvard" and did not affect other areas of Cambridge.

Harvard's Devito said the buildings affected included: the Faculty Club; the Union Dorms; the Freshman Union; Widener, Lamont, and Houghton Libraries; Claverly Hall, Dudley House's Apley Court; Stillman Infirmary; the Kennedy School of Government; Kresge Dining Hall at the Business School; and parts of Kirkland, Leverett, Lowell, Mather, Quincy and Winthrop Houses.

Devito said eight maintenance employees worked to patch together lines to restore power to the affected buildings. He said all the blacked-out buildings were linked to one of the three main lines serving the University, and that the repair crew began work late last night to find and fix the exact trouble point.

While emergency lights and backup generators provided a minimum of illumination in ballways and staireases in several blacked-out buildings, the outage bad a variety of effects on campus life. (See accompanying story)

Several students were said to have been trapped in elevators in Leverett and Mather Towers for as long as an hour before being freed.

Elevators stopped moving in Stillman Infirmary at Holyoke Center, but a University Health Services spokesman said it was only a minor inconvenience and that a backup generator allowed health care to continue uninterrupted to