Some say Alabama has four seasons: winter, spring, summer, and football.

Whether you follow the University of Alabama (Roll Tide!), Auburn University (War Eagle!), or another team, all fans can agree that a lot of work goes into putting on a major college football game.

Alabama Power works closely with both schools to make sure the lights stay on at every home game.

Photo courtesy of Jeff Etheridge with Auburn University Photographic Services.

Auburn University uses its own distribution system to deliver electricity to Jordan-Hare Stadium.

“We provide transmission service to two substations,” said Merrill Hammett, operations manager at Alabama Power’s Auburn Crew Headquarters. “We do inspections and quality control on our transmission lines. The university takes it from there.”

“We have a redundant system with two transmission feeds,” said Wade Davis, the local operations lineman (LOL) supervisor for Auburn. “An LOL is there in case of emergency if the electronics don’t work.”

One of those LOLs is Reddoch McNeal. He has dealt with such an emergency.

“A chicken snake bridged the gap on the switch at the transmission substation,” McNeal said. “He was trying to get at some birds.”

The incident took out Jordan-Hare’s stadium lights. Fortunately, the problem was discovered long before game time. Unfortunately, the snake did not make it. “He took 44,000 volts,” said McNeal. “There wasn’t a whole lot left.”

Asked which team he rooted for, McNeal was diplomatic: “They do a lot of good for the state. I like to see them both do good.”

Auburn graduate Hammett is a lifelong fan of the Tigers. “My dad and I have been going to games together since I was three years old,” he said. Their latest was the legendary Iron Bowl against Alabama last November, which Auburn won on “one of the best plays I’ve ever seen.”

Photo courtesy of Bob Blalock with Alabama Power Public Relations.

A similar system is in place at Auburn’s biggest in-state rival. “We have four substations that feed the University of Alabama,” said Mike Baker, the company’s engineering supervisor at Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa. “On game day, we station a local operations lineman at the West Campus substation.”

“If we have an outage during the game,” Baker continued, “we have two contingencies. If the university system itself gets in trouble, they have an alternate substation they can switch to. If Alabama Power loses our transmission feed to West Campus, our local lineman there can switch to another source.”

Baker said a lot of preparation and coordination goes into lighting the 101,821-seat stadium. “I put out an email 2-3 days before game day” listing the Alabama Power and university contacts on duty, he said. He has yet to witness an outage.

A 37-year Alabama Power employee, Baker is a loyal Crimson Tide alumnus and fan. He graduated during the era of coach Paul “Bear” Bryant, whose name adorns the stadium. “Bear won a championship before I started and again after I left,” he said. “But not when I was there.”

Bryant, in 25 years as Alabama’s head football coach, won six national championships and thirteen conference championships.