75-Minute Power Failure at SBCH Triggers Disaster Plan

(May 12, 2005)

Electrical power at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital was disrupted for approximately one hour and fifteen minutes [not three hours, as reported previously] on Wednesday morning [May 11], causing staff to go into emergency manual back-up mode before the problem was fixed just before 1 pm.

The situation was linked to a problem detected late Tuesday evening during a routine inspection of the hospital's electrical power system. At that time, Cottage activated its emergency back-up generators, had Southern California Edison disconnect the main power, and advised them of the need to bypass the problem area in the central power supply.

Elective surgeries for Wednesday morning were postponed while the hospital operated solely on back-up power. While Edison was completing its work, however, heat built up from the operation of the generators combined with unusually warm weather activated fire sprinklers. This in turn caused the back-up generators to fail and all electrical power was lost in the main hospital.

Staff responded according to established disaster guidelines. A series of manual back-up procedures immediately went into place.The 250 patients in the hospital at the time were never at risk, according to Alicia Kelley, vice president for patient care services. Arrangements were made with Goleta Valley Cottage Hospital and County Emergency Medical Services to accommodate serious emergencies, but power was restored shortly thereafter.

"Although this was certainly a very serious situation for the hospital and its patients," said Kelley, "at no time were there safety issues that could not be addressed promptly. I am extremely proud of our staff who throughout this challenge continued to direct priority to the care of their patients. This has never happened before, to the best of anyone's memory, and it was a true test of our disaster preparedness."

Main electrical power has now been restored, with the emergency generator system back on stand-by.

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Contact: Janet O'Neill, Public Affairs
Cottage Health System (805) 879-8980