Power outages affected several buildings on campus Monday afternoon, leaving some students scrambling to find another study spot or reconnect to their virtual classes.
The cause of the outage appeared to be a line hit by a crew working outside, according to a statement from UNC Media Relations. The University's Division of Finance & Operations wrote in a tweet around 5 p.m. that power and Wi-Fi were restored in the affected buildings.
Several popular locations on campus were affected by the outage, such as the Student Union, Lenoir Dining Hall and Carroll Hall.
Adaeze Ibeanu, a junior, was on the third floor of the Union when the outage began. She was in the middle of a virtual class when the lights and Wi-Fi suddenly went off, and the fire alarm soon followed.
“We walked out and people were a bit confused about where to go,” Ibeanu said. “I sat down at one of the outdoor tables and resumed my class."
Ibeanu said she saw confused students migrating to South Campus after the evacuation, searching for buildings with intact power and Wi-Fi.
Libraries on campus, such as Wilson and Davis, also experienced power outages, according to a tweet from UNC Library. This affected many students — Davis alone has study rooms on six of its floors.
First-year Peyton Hodak was in Davis amid the chaos.
“At first, I thought the power was going to come back on, so I just kept working until the alarms went off,” Hodak said.
