While Cornell was spared the full force of superstorm Sandy, for some Ivies in the storm’s path the recovery process has just begun.
After being closed Monday and Tuesday due to hurricane-force winds, torrential rain and rising seas, six other Ivies — Brown University, Columbia University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, the University of Pennsylvania and Yale University — were scheduled to resume classes Wednesday morning.
Princeton University, which lies not far from Sandy’s point of landfall south of Atlantic City, N.J., will remain closed Wednesday, according to The Daily Princetonian. As of 1 a.m., over 60 roads in the borough and township of Princeton were closed and 80 percent of Princeton residents were without power, the paper stated.
The storm caused minimal damage to Dartmouth’s campus, according to The Dartmouth, though it was the “fourth-worst storm in terms of power loss in New Hampshire state history.”
Penn was similarly spared, with university officials saying the school was “lucky” to have avoided being extensively damaged.
“When you look at all the devastation around us, whether it’s the Jersey Shore or New York City, I think we’re incredibly fortunate,” Executive Vice President Craig Carnaroli told The Daily Pennsylvanian. “I’d consider Penn lucky.”
While the superstorm caused historic levels of flooding in lower Manhattan, flooding subway lines and turning streets into rivers, Columbia’s campus in the Morningside Heights neighborhood was left “relatively unscathed,” according to the Columbia Daily Spectator. While the storm caused some windows to break and a few trees to fall, the campus’ location on relatively high ground spared it from the flooding seen in other parts of the city.
Original Author: David Marten