Word: steams
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...tunnels vary in size, but most are about eight feet square, with 12- and 10-inch steam pipes along each wall-their 380 degree-plus surface temperatures dulled by four inches of insulation. Inside steam rushes by at 100 pounds of pressure. Overhead are the black cables that bring the University power and communications ("We don't have telephone poles," says Secretary of the Faculty John B. Fox Jr. '59), and underfoot is brown residue from shallow pools of groundwater...
During the winter, when each of the three steam pipes hits 430 degrees, the temperature in some parts of the tunnels can climb past 100 degrees...
...kind of like a cool steam bath," says Harry A. Hawkes, director for engineering and utilities, who oversees the tunnels' operation most directly...
However, on some occasions the tunnels can still be dangerous. Last Monday, a steam pipe-gasket leak in the Yard flooded the tunnels in that area with steam and short-circuited the lights, leaving tunnels from the Science Center to Widener Library completely blacked...
Another tunnel system was built around the same time that the steam tunnels were extended, linking a central kitchen under Eliot House with smaller "finishing kitchens" in Eliot, Kirkland, Lowell, Winthrop and Leverett houses...