The Journal

At about 5 a.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 26, the server suddenly crashed. And, in quick succession, so did the Internet, phones and safety of those on campus.

Those unlucky enough to have been awake at the time of the outage, including editors of The Journal, were stuck, twiddling their thumbs.

The outage occurred right as The Journal staff was preparing to send its finalized pages to the printer. An already lengthy production was stretched another two exhausting hours.

But a few tired editors were the least of WU's problems.

WU's Web site wouldn't load, meaning no access to contact information of WU's staff, IT or even Public Safety personnel. Those who happened to have Public Safety's number in their cell phone were out of luck - the phone system was also out, meaning every phone number on campus reached a busy signal.

Furthermore, the blue safety boxes on campus, which are also connected to the WU network, were useless. After pushing the emergency button, the intercom that is supposed to reach Public Safety also aired only a busy signal and the blue light on top went off for less than a minute then turned off, without a public safety officer coming to the rescue.

To make matters worse, after trekking to the Public Safety office 15 minutes after the system went down, the officer holding on watch said she was unable to contact anyone for information about the predicament because all of the necessary phone numbers were on WU's Web site.

Any student needing immediate assistance was rendered helpless until 6:30 a.m., when the system was put on emergency power. Despite the minimal amount of time the system was down, the safety of everyone who works at and attends WU was temporarily helpless.

Even the phones in WU's dorms were effected. For about 90 minutes, every student on the WU campus was potentially vulnerable. Granted, most people have cell phones but any campus emergency would be exacerbated with out the use of the network.

The failure of one electronic component put students and WU's facilities at risk.

While Webster Groves is a relatively safe neighborhood, anything is possible. No community is absolutely safe from fires, accidents and criminal activity. Students need to know their safety isn't in jeopardy because of faulty equipment or the lack of an adequate fail-safe system.

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