Any explanation how we lost it for 70 minutes?
Big bird? (kidding)
So far, they're blaming it on the possibility of the storms. Downed powerlines, etc. O'Hare and Midway both running several hours behind schedule according to CLTV.
It sounds like sloppy installation work in the central office. The normal standard is to connect the equipment to a battery string that supplies -48 volts at continuous loads of nearly 5,000 amps. The strings are charged by a rectifier bank from commercial electric power. If the commercial power is lost, a gas turbine or diesel electric generator fires up automatically. Once the emergency generator stable, it takes over charging the batteries until the commercial power is restored. Most central offices keep 30 days of fuel in reserve and test the emergency generator every 30 days.
Can you tell I'm a former central office equipment engineer?