Exonians Survive Blackout
Can Exonians survive without Wi-Fi and power? The question was put to the test Sunday afternoon, when the town of Exeter lost power for approximately three hours. Senior Austin Fruchter and upper Brandon Gardner can attest to how shocking it was.Before the power outage, Fruchter and Gardner got into the elevator and starting going up to the third floor. All of a sudden the lights went out, the elevator started to shake and vibrate, and an orange light started flashing. "I looked at Brandon and his face was bright red like he just saw death, and I'm sure I looked the same. Then my mind went to ‘How do I survive this if it falls all the way to the floor?’” Fruchter said. The elevator stopped seconds later, and all Fruchter and Gardner could do was wait. "I started mashing the call button, and we got put on hold, so I pressed the alarm button. Then I finally saw a hand opening the elevator," Fruchter said.Exonians learned what life is like without Wi-Fi in a world so heavily reliant on the Internet. "It's impairing my studying and my performance. Now I'll have to make up the work I was supposed to do now some other time," prep Claire Dauge-Roth said.Other students also complained about how the Wi-Fi going down made them lose their precious relaxation time. "I was playing Mario Kart with some guys in Ewald, and when the power went out, the screen went black, and none of us knew what to do with our time,” Weatherbie said.The only place on campus with full power and Wi-Fi was Love Gym.. Upper Erin McSally was one of the many students working in the library when the power went out, after which she decided to go to the gym and work out instead. "When I was on the treadmill, a ton of students came wandering in and out over the course of half an hour,” McSally said. "When I left the weight room and went into the hall, people were sitting on the floor typing away with their Macs."Dean of Residential Life AJ Cosgrove explained that there are generators in the key parts of campus. The gym still had power and Wi-Fi because Campus Safety has a generator there to make sure that they can continue working. There are generators for emergency lighting in dorms and in Elm Street Dining Hall.The one place you wouldn't want to be on campus, besides an elevator, of course, was the black box in Fisher Theater. Lower Ruby Fludzinski, director of one of DRAMAT plays that afternoon, said, "It was scary being in black box at first because it was completely pitch black, but I got a lantern and we got some flashlights and opened the emergency window for some natural light."The DRAMAT productions were supposed to begin at 1 p.m., but the power went out at around 12:20 p.m. "First we called Campus Safety, and they told us it was a campuswide blackout, so Hannah Marudzinski, our producer, decided to put all of the chairs on stage and open the emergency window over the audience for natural light. We performed the show in the audience, and it was still really dark, but the show must go on!” Fludzinski said.Not only did the blackout have Exonians on campus going crazy, the phenomenon sent the town of Exeter into chaos. The traffic lights went out, shops had no power, and restaurants couldn't make hot food. Lower Hannah Elwell said, "Sundays are usually the day that I use to camp out in D^2 and do homework. But if they expect me to actually do my homework I have to be caffeinated, and let's face it, you can get coffee or tea at D-Hall and be just fine, but seriously who wants that?"Cosgrove also explained his concerns about power outages at Exeter. "Although many dorms are powered with steam heat, there are some dorms that might get affected, which is an obvious concern,” Cosgrove said. “Also, students probably found out that during a power outage, it's hard to get into the dorms. If a power outage lasted for an extended period of time, however, we would probably have discussions about sending people home.”Exeter learned that it can survive during blackouts, but just barely.