Updated Nov. 3 at 9:25 a.m.:
On Thursday, Nov. 2, AdventHealth Porter announced the following:
Our original story follows below.
AdventHealth Porter hospital spent the past two days discharging and relocating patients from its building near Harvard Gulch on Downing Street after a boiler went bad, the heat went out and there was no hot water to sterilize equipment.
The hospital's incident command process kicked into gear. The emergency room was shuttered. Surgical procedures were canceled. Ambulances lined up outside the hospital to take patients to AdventHealth locations in Parker, Littleton and Castle Rock.
Behavioral health patients were harder to find a space for, since there are so few beds in the metro area. Eventually, they were relocated to Denver Springs, Centennial Peaks and the University of Colorado Health at Anschutz hospitals.
The AdventHealth Porter building went dark. Happily, nobody died and hospital CEO Todd Folkenberg believes that nobody's health outcomes worsened.
But there's a looming question: Shouldn't there be redundancies in a boiler system to prevent this sort of disaster to begin with?
Yes, Folkenberg told Denverite. "Best practice is to have a minimum of two boilers running."
So what went wrong?
"We actually ordered a new boiler in August of 2021," Folkenberg explained. "And due to COVID and supply chains, logistical issues, which I think, you know, we all face in one form or fashion, that delivery was delayed over a year."
The new boiler finally arrived and has been sitting in the Plant Operations Department while staff wait for new parts to arrive to bring that boiler online.
Meanwhile, the hospital still had two boilers running -- until mid-September, when one went offline.
After that boiler failed, the hospital put in an immediate order for a temporary emergency one from Texas.
That one is slated to arrive by truck on Halloween night.
"The problem is Murphy's Law kind of kicked in," Folkenberg said.
A coil in the last remaining boiler blew over the weekend, during the first cold spell of the fall.
So until the backup boiler arrives tonight and the other boiler in waiting can be installed -- hopefully before next Monday -- the hospital will be shut down.
Once the hospital reopens, "We will continue to have boiler redundancy once we get back up and running full throttle," Folkenberg said.
