WWU students go without heat amid single digit temps, 20 mph winds

WESTERN WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, Wash. — Western Washington University students faced a new assignment over the last couple of days – to stay warm inside their homes.

Students who live at Elevate Bellingham told KIRO 7 that the building’s power and water had gone out on Thursday night, forcing many residents to scramble to stay warm amid the sub-freezing temperatures.

“Never felt anything like this before,” said WWU sophomore resident Ayden Evans “We had 20 miles per hour winds, but it feels like on the weather app, it says like feels like negative 16 degrees sometimes.”

“We literally saw everyone’s power is on,” Ayden added as he described seeing residents in nearby homes and apartments having power.

“We were driving a couple of blocks that way and saw the transformer blow up,” said WWU sophomore Marek Valvas, another on-campus resident.

We spoke with management at the apartment complex about the incident.

Management said the entire block had lost power on Thursday night, and the water was temporarily off Friday.

“I just throw on three layers of pants, two layers of shirts, two sweatshirts, and I grabbed all my blankets and stuff and bundled up,” said Ayden.

KIRO 7 News received an email that had been written by the company and sent out to the residents.

With recent events here are the following updates: Elevate will be offering reimbursements for hotel accommodations to all units without power & water.

Due to recent events, in addition to the power being out, we have gotten reports of a broken pipe outside the 2nd-floor parking garage. As an immediate action, we had to shut off the water in order to mitigate the damage. We will provide you updates as soon as we get them, as we have technicians on-site working on fixing the issues.

The email continued to write, Please know our onsite team is actively working very hard and as quickly as possible to address the ongoing issues.

As of Saturday afternoon, the building has power and water running, management said.

KIRO 7 News reached out to Puget Sound Energy to learn more about how its crews responded to the power outages.

We’re still waiting to hear back.

We looked on the company’s website and did not see any power outages in the area as of Saturday afternoon.

A spokesperson with the Bellingham Fire Department said it did not have any reports or calls about the incident on file.

A spokesperson for Western Washington University confirmed with us that the apartment building is not owned by the university.

Evans said the last couple of days have been difficult for him and his friends.

“The next day we went to school, went to class, no shower, no heat. Had to brush my teeth. Had to pour water on our tooth brush.” Evans added, “I had to go to the gym, shower at the gym. It’s pretty frustrating, but it happens. We all understand that. It’s not Elevate’s fault, but it does get pretty hard.”

“We chucked as much food as we could in the freezer because it’s going to be the coldest. And then when the water went out yesterday, we tried to leave our pipes dripping so they wouldn’t completely freeze, but you couldn’t do much,” said Valvas. “It’s been obviously a little expensive. We had to go get breakfast this morning because we can’t make food. We had to buy dinner last night.”

The apartment’s management said they had offered to reimburse residents, who wanted to stay inside a hotel amid the power outages, of up to $180, and asked residents to keep their receipts.

Residents were also offered reimbursement for their groceries, management added.

Management told KIRO 7 News they did everything they could to help residents.

Ayden said he does not blame Elevate for the situation, however, he also understands not all residents were able to take advantage of the reimbursement since they could not afford the upfront costs.

“It’s definitely hard. Some people have to stay (in apartment) because they obviously can’t afford it,” he added.

KIRO 7 News was told that people experiencing homelessness got inside the building when it had lost power.

Management told us complaints around the incident were filed to police.

KIRO 7 News reached out to the Bellingham Police Department to get more details around this incident.

We’re still waiting to hear back.

“I’m very grateful for what I have,” said Ayden. “I can be in a building. Obviously there’s people on the street who don’t’ have this stuff, so I’m thankful.”

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