Power outages shake up lights, PCR, server

Kelly+Shen+%2812%29+sits+in+the+darkness+of+the+library+after+school+last+Friday+when+the+power+on+the+upper+school+went+out%2C+affecting+lights+across+campus.+This+outage+followed+a+series+of+short+outages+on+Thursday+and+Friday%2C+and+over+the+weekend%2C+another+outage+caused+a+PCR%2C+server+and+phone+shutdown+across+the+upper+school+campus.

Irina Malyugina

Kelly Shen (12) sits in the darkness of the library after school last Friday when the power on the upper school went out, affecting lights across campus. This outage followed a series of short outages on Thursday and Friday, and over the weekend, another outage caused a PCR, server and phone shutdown across the upper school campus.

by Arushi Saxena and Kathy Fang

School servers, portals, phones and email system crashed over the weekend due to a power outage that struck the upper school campus, following two days of intermittent outages. According to current reports, all Harker systems have come back online.

In an email to parents on March 2, Head of School Brian Yager announced Harker’s plans to have electricians assessing the situation the next day and restoring electricity to the campus. As of midnight on March 3, email and phones were down across all four campuses. Additionally, since PCR was down, students were provided make-up opportunities for work that was incomplete and due on Monday due to the service interruption.

Emails to school personnel were not delivered throughout the period that the power was out, but as of the evening of March 3, an announcement made by the Office of Communications through portals said that the server was catching up with backlogged emails while power and phone service were fully restored to the Saratoga campus.

Lights flickered off across campus last Friday from 2:38 p.m. to 2:46 p.m. as the power on the upper school campus faltered, following a complete power outage earlier that morning before school as well as another complete outage on Thursday at around 7 a.m.

Though the two morning outages on Thursday and Friday led to the failure of PCR, Wi-Fi and the bell system, both Wi-Fi and PCR systems were still functioning during the outage on Friday afternoon.

The cause of the power outages is still unknown.

This is a developing story. Check Harker Aquila for further updates.