(A copy of the incident report will be added later)
Mike D'Angelo, Facilities manager
provided a brief overview of the incident over New Year's weekend
Kennedy SchoolMcGann - questioning the presence of a sensor that could have caught the problem.
D'Angelo - yes, the sensor would be valuable, it would not have tripped due to the temperature level in 2 of the 3 buildings as the temp had not dropped enough
Bartlett - I lost power and when it came back, the heat kicked in as well, why not here?
D'Angelo - These motors are protected by circuits and code to protect it from severe spikes in power. Normally, when the power returns, they would have come back. When the power did return, it only came back with 2 of 3 phases. Sensing that, the motor required a manual restart.
Nutting - The motor is about the size of a full keg of beer.
Doak - clarification on what the problem really was, temperature monitors are not going to solve this problem. Why couldn't we get notification from the power company?
Whalen - I am focused on how we can try and avoid this going forward. Anytime the power goes out we have to be notified?
D'Angelo - yes, we should. The boilers were sitting with hot water but it wasn't circulating.
High SchoolMcGann - generator at the high school?
D'Angelo - generator was on and ran all the time
McGann - with the generator on, how did we get the freeze up?
D'Angelo - motor starters did trip, likely because of the 2 of 3 phase power return
McGann - with the money we paid for those generators at the high school and senior center, we should not have had this
D'Angelo - they were in the trip position when we arrived. The heating contractor reset the trips.
Doak - is there a test we can do to see if everything is running properly?
D'Angelo - I think if there is one leg off, this would happen.
McGann - on the power side yes, on the generator side, that is three phase power, this should have come right back on
Zollo - 2 high level principles that I am looking at here. There are experts in these areas, yourself and others, let's get a plan to solve the problem for these extreme contingency events. There will be capital required, and I understand that.
There needs to be monitoring with call outs to multiple points so that when something else comes up, we'll at least have been alerted to address something sooner rather than later.
Pfeffer - if it seems like you are being picked on, you are. You are the Director of Facilities. People are not happy with what happened. The Senior Center was 38 degrees on Friday. Some seniors are dependent upon the center for their food. That is unacceptable.
D'Angelo - getting to the actual root of the problem will help us prevent this in the future. The eyes and ears of a person walking in to check a building will be done over long weekend and other periods going forward.
Doak - will we get a break from the insurance company for putting these other monitoring devices in?
Nutting - Not sure, our out of pocket is $5,000. The insurance will cover the repairs.
Senior CenterHeard about it first on Friday with the Fire Department picking up an alarm.
McGann - Do you have the generators on a cycle?
D'Angelo - yes, they are run once a week, I don't remember the day of the week.
McGann - When all things are back and ready, I would suggest that some time, off hours, we do a test. Make sure that all things are working as they are supposed to be. It doesn't seem right to me.
Pfeffer - Do we have to worry about mold?
D'Angelo - with what we are doing, I don't expect to but if necessary we will.
Feeley - would it be reasonable to come back in 2 weeks with a plan?
D'Angelo - It would be better to do it a little later. Early in February would be better.
Gym floor will be a big one to replace. It really crimps the high school to ahve the gym out. All the recreation programs are already taking space in the other gyms in town.
