There was a major power outage on Tuesday evening that affected several buildings here on campus including the entire Space Sciences Laboratory. Power has been restored this morning, and we are slowly getting the project back on line.

More detail (from Jon - another systems administrator here at the lab):

Power failed when there was a short in the power distribution lines that feed the hill buildings [including Space Sciences Laboratory, Math Science Research Institute, Lawrence Hall of Science]. The short occurred because of deterioration of the insulation on these power lines, which are buried in a conduit in the ground. The power distribution lines are thousands of feet long, originating in a substation at LBL below LHS. Most of this conduit only contain one power line, but we were lucky in that the section that failed had two power lines in it, so the electricians could just utilize the second unused line to restore electrical service. It was an arduous process finding just where the short was, since they had to disconnect one segment at a time and test it. This is why it took so long to find and repair.

- Matt