At approximately 12:30 p.m. today, South Campus Commons, parts of Old Town and businesses spanning Route 1 lost power.
At the same time, on-campus academic buildings — primarily on McKeldin Mall — also experienced a short light-flickering before the lights came back on.
While initial approximations estimated for power to be restored by 4 p.m., Pepco spokesman Marcus Beal said the company now expects everything to be restored at about 8 p.m.
A tree falling on a power line caused this outage, Beal said, and the tree brought down more equipment than the company initially thought. Approximately 1,300 people have been affected.
“We have a tree that fell on one of our power lines coming from one of our substations. So we have a crew assigned to that,” Beal said.
In addition, eateries below The Domain appear to be closed. The Diamondback also tried reaching out to popular downtown eateries Chipotle, Noodles and Company, Panda Express, Cornerstone Grill & Loft, Nando’s Peri-Peri and Jason’s Deli, but none of the establishments answered their phones.
A Jimmy John’s employee said the establishment is open and doing deliveries, but is only accepting cash.
The Diamondback will continue to provide updates as they come in.
