For those of you who don't know anything about living in the mountains, there are frequent power outages. And for those of you who don't know anything about hotels, we rely on our computers for pretty much everything.
Well, at Yellowstone, power outages happen constantly. Of course, we have plans in place for these issues. However, when the power goes out for 5 hours, it becomes a struggle. Two days ago, the power did in fact go out for 5 hours, probably due to the crazy wind we've been having. We think that some trees knocked down a power line, but we never actually found out the real cause. And of course, I was working the front desk while all this was happening. Most places had computer access, as the computers run on generators, but at the Lodge, something happened with our generators, and they only stuck around for about 30 minutes. When that happens, we have to manually do everything. And I mean everything. That causes a little bit of panic, since we have to then worry about sending more than one person to the same room. Then, there's the panic of what happens if the sun goes down and power isn't up. It doesn't get dark around here until around 9:30 or 10, which is very helpful. Thanks to our wonderful maintenance staff, we got power back, and our generators started working. I was so thankful that everyone kept their cool and didn't show the stress and panic on their faces when talking to guests. I work with some great people who take direction well. Working as a slight superior (I'm called a Senior Guest Service Attendant, and have a few more responsibilities), it is insanely helpful when the people you work with have respect for you and are willing to help in any way possible. Needless to say, though, we were all happy when we could go home on Sunday. I was looking forward to an easy shift on Monday.
So, when Monday rolls around, and I get to work, I notice that our computers aren't working. When I look at my co-workers, they all meet me with a deadpan look. Turns out that our server is down across the entire park, and it probably won't be back up until around 4:30, which is check-in time. Awesome. When it finally gets to be about 4:00, my manager tells me to just start checking people in manually. At this point, I'm prepping myself for another long, stressful night. Thank god I was around for the previous night, or I would have been in another state of panic. Having experienced this whole thing before, I wasn't worried. Until I saw the reports we had printed out. When the power goes down, we immediately print reports of rooms we have left to give out, who is going to check in, and who is check in already. Since the computers had been out nearly all day, I didn't have the right lists. We a few reports from earlier that day, and a report of rooms from the night before. This became really stressful, but again, thanks to an excellent staff, we were able to get through it. At around, maybe 6:00ish, the computers came back up. It was so exciting, but then we were faced with the issue that we would still have to do everything manually, since we hadn't checked people in on the computer yet, so our inventories of rooms would be all wonky. I know a lot of this is hotel jargon, but I hope you understand how much work it takes to check people in off of lists that might not even be accurate. And having worked the night before, I was not in the mood to have another difficult shift. But, we got through it somehow.
Anyway, I'm hoping my shift tonight is a complete breeze. I'm really, really looking forward to having Wednesday and Thursday off.
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