This morning I headed off to work in a good mood. Jason was going in late today so he got me Tim Horton's and then dropped me off at work. I was determined that today was going to be a good day no matter what happened. Why of all days did I choose today???
First, I get in and I have several emails about not being able to run reports out of our system. At first I assumed they were doing something wrong, but I was also unable to run reports. This was a big problem because today is the day I run the weekly reports. So I emailed the appropriate people and waited. About an hour later I had start making phone calls to make sure this was getting someone's attention. I was trying not to get frustrated because, after all, today was going to be a good day.
Emails started to be exchanged and it looked like we were moving forward on getting the reports fixed. I got almost all the work done that was needed before reports could be run and I was actually feeling ahead of the game. Today was going to be a good day.
And then the lights went out. I looked and my computer was dead and the phone was dead too. Unbelievable! Our building had lost power. People started walking around asking what had happened, but none of us knew. Rumors started going around that all of downtown was without power. We were up on the 19th floor so we started watching stop lights at 3rd and Main - they were working. Then 2nd and Main, those were working. As were the stop lights on Ludlow. We soon realized that only the block at Courthouse Square was without power. (I work in the old MeadWestvaco building, now called Key Bank Tower.) This was about 11:15 am.
We started calling people to find out if they had heard any news about what was going on. (It didn't make the news.) We also waited to hear any news about an emergency. We didn't hear any explosions, didn't smell any smoke, and there were no emergency vehicles around the building. We started wondering if there really was a problem, how would they get the news to us?
Around 12:30 pm we still didn't have any news other than a transformer had blown in front of the building. So a few of us decided to head down the 21 flights of stairs and get some lunch. There was one major problem with this - there were no lights in the stairwells. We only had one flashlight on our floor and it was being used in the bathroom. I had a candle (tealight in a glass candle holder) that a coworker gave me years ago for Christmas, and I had kept it on my desk. The other ladies were trying to use their cell phones to light the stairs.
We saw three of the emergency lights on, but the rest were not. All we could think was that the batteries had run down and they had not been checked since. The 14th and 15th floors are double floors and there's also a shift in the stairs where you have to walk down a hallway. We couldn't tell where we were going between our candle and cell phones. We just went really really slow and took one flight at a time. The worst part was trying to find the first step for each flight. I was so afraid I'd put my foot out there and miss the step.
Finally around the 7th floor two maintenance men with flashlights who were checking floors helped us continue down the stairs. One in the front, one in the back. And then finally we were on the first floor, with wobbly knees and rubber legs. While we were congratulating ourselves we turned around and another group came down the last stairs. They were on the top floor - the 27th floor - and one of the ladies looked about 7 months pregnant. So no complaints from me!
Three of us decided to head to Uno's to sit for awhile, get some lunch, and wait for the electricity to come back on. While we were walking out the front doors we heard some of the DP&L workers say that the electricity should be back on in about an hour. Perfect! There was a short discussion about whether or not the 15 minutes spent going downstairs counted as part of lunch break or not. We all agreed it was not!
After lunch we started walking back to the building and noticed the lights were on in our building. We got in the building and a lot of people were standing around in the lobby. The elevators had just started working again and no one seemed in a hurry to head back up to work. I believe the main worry was getting stuck in the elevator if the electricity went out again. (If you remember, last September when most of Dayton lost electricity for days, it wasn't unusual for it go off right after it came back on.)
The three of us decided that we braved the stairs down, we could brave the elevator back up. And we were fine, of course. However, back on the 19th floor we realized that only the front side of the building had electricity. The phones and computers still did not have power. Another problem was that there was no running water, so no flush on the toilets. (And unfortunately I forgot to go at Uno's when I had the chance.)
A little after 2pm the power to the computers and phones came back on. This caused a lot of excitement until we realized that the servers had been turned off so still had no access to emails, the internet or our documents, and no phones. I kept calling my boss in Cleveland and giving him updates on what was going on. And finally, a little after 3pm, the server was back up and running and the office was functional again! (Except that most everyone had left to work from home.)
So I get into Outlook to find out what the status of the reports was... still not working. I had to start on the reports at 4:30 pm or they wouldn't get sent out by 5pm. The problem was that the software support people were telling us to reinstall the system, but our IS people didn't want to. There was quite a bit of back and forth and finally I got the email at 4:15 that the software had been reinstalled and I could run the reports. At 4:45 pm I finally had all the reports done.
Never did I have any idea this morning that it would take so long to get those ... reports done. And was it a good day? I'm trying really hard to see the good in that day. I ended up with a headache after going down all those steps (probably from straining my eyes and worrying the whole time). And I know my legs are going to hurt tomorrow. But on the good side, I got to do lunch with 2 friends who never go out for lunch and really talk. I'm sure there were other good things that will come out of that experience, but I'll think of those tomorrow.
For now I'm grateful for lights, running water, and being connected to the internet. I just find it hard to believe that twice now in 8 months we've lost electricity in situations that have never happened before. Will this continue to happen? I'm starting to think I should carry a flashlight with me. Just in case.
