Copper Theft at UH Blacks Out University Center

Thieves made off with copper wiring from UH’s University Center late Saturday night, a UH public safety department bulletin reports: A contractor noticed early Sunday morning that the wiring had gone missing; a reader tells Swamplot that this knocked out the building’s power and is delaying renovations. The Barnes & Noble and Cougar Byte stores inside the UC have been scrambling to set up temporary locations elsewhere on campus.

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The University Center faces the on-campus Hilton and sits behind the M.D. Anderson Library. Renovations have been underway since last summer; these renderings suggest what the first phrase of the project could look like when it’s completed in January 2014.

The most recent Facebook updates from the bookstore and Cougar Byte say they will be closed for up to 2 weeks.

Images: Flickr user University Centers (building); The New UC (renderings)

13 Comment

  • The copper wasn’t stolen, the new politically correct term is Redistributed.

  • ^Your gonna have to troll better than that.

  • Musta been the hipsters or Odumbo, right common?

  • You’re going to need to learn proper grammer, Jim.

  • “You’re going to need to learn proper grammEr, Jim.”

  • ^no need to be a grammar nazi; we all know what he meant = mission accomplished.

  • When one comforts a grammar nazi, they just need hug him and whisper “There, Their, They’re”.

  • wow, only 1 comment even closely related to post. this must be a new Swamplot record. Impressive!

  • @Amanda

    glad you aren’t disturbing the trend :)

  • Point? There’s supposed to be a point to this???

  • I actually count zero comments related to the post, Amanda. What else does one say in a story about copper theft where the lead comment is a political eye-roller?

  • OK, I’ll comment on the story. First of all, I thought that these metal thieves usually targeted areas that were completely deserted (for instance, foreclosed houses or construction sites that are unguarded at night). It seems pretty audacious to steal copper from a building in the middle of campus. Second, copper wire isn’t usually all that accessible in finished buildings, right? Was this wire accessible because of the renovations? Third, if it knocked out power for the building, that suggests it was live wire. Seems pretty risky stealing wires with current running through them. Too bad the thieves weren’t zapped. And finally, who the hell is buying stolen copper wire? Is anything being done to stop these fences?

  • Some day we’ll read about copper thieves getting fried(maybe to death)as they try to steal wiring. That would be fitting . And just think of all the time,trouble,money and energy that the judicial system would save!!!