{
  "id": "2023-12-18-university-of-new-hampshire-durham-power-outage",
  "slug": "university-of-new-hampshire-durham-power-outage-2023-12-18",
  "institution": {
    "name": "University of New Hampshire",
    "shortName": "UNH",
    "state": "NH",
    "type": "public-r2",
    "alertSystemName": "UNH Alert",
    "enrollment": 13000
  },
  "incident": {
    "date": "2023-12-18",
    "type": "power-outage",
    "cleryCategory": "advisory",
    "headline": "'Anticipate an Update Within 2 Hours': UNH's Durham Campus Loses Power Mid-Morning",
    "summary": "The [University of New Hampshire's Durham campus](https://x.com/UNH_Police/status/1736783833263902962) lost power in a significant outage shortly before midday on December 18, 2023. UNH Police posted a UNH Alert on both X and Facebook telling the campus that crews were working to restore power and that an update should follow within two hours; publicly available reporting does not establish the outage's cause or the exact time power was fully restored."
  },
  "alerts": [
    {
      "sequence": 1,
      "type": "initial",
      "timestamp": "2023-12-18T11:21:00-05:00",
      "channel": "twitter-x",
      "verbatimText": "UNH Alert: UNH Durham Campus currently experiencing a significant power outage, crews are working to restore, anticipate an update within 2 hours",
      "isVerbatimConfirmed": true,
      "sourceUrl": "https://x.com/UNH_Police/status/1736783833263902962",
      "sourceDescription": "UNH Police Department (@UNH_Police) on X",
      "annotations": [
        "Posted at 11:21 a.m. EST on a Monday, mid-morning during the fall semester's final-exams period, when a campus-wide outage would disrupt in-progress testing",
        "UNH Police cross-posted essentially the same alert to Facebook at roughly the same time, giving the message two independent official channels rather than one",
        "The alert sets a concrete two-hour expectation for the next update rather than an open-ended 'stay tuned,' a specific commitment that is unusual among the outage alerts in this archive"
      ],
      "characterCount": 145
    }
  ],
  "context": "UNH Police issued a UNH Alert just after 11:20 a.m. on Monday, December 18, 2023, notifying the Durham campus of [a significant power outage](https://x.com/UNH_Police/status/1736783833263902962) and telling the community that crews were working to restore service, with a further update expected within two hours. The same message was cross-posted to [UNH Police's Facebook page](https://www.facebook.com/UNHPolice/), giving the outage notice two parallel official channels. Publicly available reporting reviewed for this case does not establish what caused the outage or precisely when power was fully restored to campus, only the initial alert's text could be confirmed verbatim from UNH Police's own social media posts. The outage fell during UNH's December final-exams period, when even a temporary loss of power to classroom and library buildings can disrupt in-progress testing.",
  "keyFindings": [
    "UNH Police committed to a specific follow-up window ('anticipate an update within 2 hours') rather than open-ended language, a concrete, falsifiable promise that most outage alerts in this archive do not make",
    "The same alert text was posted to two separate official channels (X and Facebook) within a short window, reflecting a cross-platform posting practice rather than a single-channel release",
    "The outage struck during UNH's December final-exams period, a timing detail that matters for impact even though the alert itself does not mention exams",
    "No secondary reporting (local news, student newspaper) confirming the outage's cause or exact restoration time could be located, illustrating how a real, verbatim-confirmed alert can still leave an incident's resolution undocumented in public sources"
  ],
  "responseTimeMinutes": null,
  "sources": [
    {
      "title": "UNH Police Department on X: UNH Alert power outage notice",
      "url": "https://x.com/UNH_Police/status/1736783833263902962",
      "type": "official-social"
    },
    {
      "title": "UNH Police Department | Durham NH (Facebook)",
      "url": "https://www.facebook.com/UNHPolice/",
      "type": "official-social"
    },
    {
      "title": "University Alerts & Storm Information | University of New Hampshire",
      "url": "https://www.unh.edu/university-alerts-storm-information",
      "type": "official-archive"
    },
    {
      "title": "Campus Alerts | Police Department | University of New Hampshire",
      "url": "https://www.unh.edu/upd/crime-prevention/campus-alerts",
      "type": "official-archive"
    }
  ],
  "confidence": "medium",
  "tags": [
    "power-outage",
    "new-hampshire",
    "durham",
    "unh-alert",
    "finals-week",
    "infrastructure-failure",
    "twitter-x"
  ],
  "dateAdded": "2026-07-03",
  "lastUpdated": "2026-07-03",
  "addedBy": "ingestion"
}